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People-Smart
Sustainable Cities
Geneva, 2020
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
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ECE/INF/2020/3
FOREWORD
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with its seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), provides
an ambitious and comprehensive framework that opens new perspectives for policymaking and international
cooperation. While progress on its implementation is being made, current efforts are far below the scale needed to
deliver the SDGs within the next ten years. Ambitious action becomes even more important in the context of the
response to the COVID-19 pandemic: the SDGs are vital for a recovery that leads to greener, more inclusive economies,
and stronger, more resilient countries.
UNECE supports its member States in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda through concrete and results-oriented
activities, in areas covered in its eight sub-programmes: environment, transport, statistics, economic cooperation and
integration,Foreword
sustainable energy, trade, timber and forestry, and housing, land management and population.
Olga Algayerova
Olga Algayerova
Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations
Executive Secretary
Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Percentage of the population residing in urban areas: United Nations forecast for 2020 and 2050 . . . . 8
Figure 2: GDP PPP per capita in ex-socialist countries compared to the world, European Union and China, 2019 . 9
Figure 3: Distribution of urban population by settlement size, 2015 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10
Figure 4: The causation of disaster risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20
Figure 5: Options of mobility as a Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31
Figure 6: Experimental culture in government . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .54
Figure 7: COVID cycling lane in New Brighton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55
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LIST OF BOXES
Box 1: What is UNECE and the UNECE region? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Box 2: Defining innovation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Box 3: The New Urban Agenda and its implementation in the UNECE region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Box 4: United for Smart Sustainable Cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Box 5: Urban deindustrialization and monotowns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Box 6: The Geneva Ministerial Declaration on Sustainable Housing and Urban Development . . . . . . . . . .11
Box 7: Smartphone applications for city users . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Box 8: A surveillance feast in time of pandemics: a glimpse of the dystopian future? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15
Box 9: Smart ageing for sustainable cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17
Box 10: The Paris Agreement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18
Box 11: Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
Box 12: How Murmansk plans to reverse its population decline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24
Box 13: The foundational economy – a spatial strategy for everyone everywhere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Box 14: The Intelligent Cities Challenge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26
Box 15: The “hyper-proximity” plan of Paris . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28
Box 16: Urban transport statistics and COVID-19 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Box 17: The benefits of platform economy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Box 18: Mobility as a service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Box 19: Smart city experiments in Toronto and Barcelona . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32
Box 20: “Comfortable city” programme of Moscow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .37
Box 21: Addressing climate neutrality in buildings through the international centres of excellence . . . . . . .41
Box 22: The equitable access principles of the Protocol on Water and Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Box 23: The World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46
Box 24: International standards for preventing food losses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48
Box 25: Urban Living Labs as experimental platforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Box 26: The small industrial town of Renens reinventing itself through innovation ecosystems . . . . . . . . . .55
Box 27: UNECE Portal on Standards for the Sustainable Development Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .56
Box 28: What Works Centres in the United Kingdom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .57
Box 29: People-first Public-Private Partnership instruments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Box 30: The Aarhus Convention and its Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers . . . . . . . . . . .60
Box 31: Engaging citizens: public participation platforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .61
Box 32: The Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .63
Box 33: Multilateral environmental agreements to support transboundary cooperation and risk mitigation . 63
Box 34: Sustainable transit in the Cardiff Capital Region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .64
Box 35: UNECE Forum of Mayors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .65
LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Contribution of robotics and autonomous systems to solving urban challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13
Table 2: Multi-scale framework for sustainable housing policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34
Table 3: Examples of social infrastructure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The publication “People-Smart Sustainable Cities” was developed by the United Nations Economic Commission for
Europe as a part of the work of its nexus on “Sustainable and smart cities for all ages”.
Valuable contributions were received from the members of the nexus. The following people are acknowledged for
their contributions:
Author:
Dr. Oleg Golubchikov ���������������������������������� Professor, Lecturer, Cardiff University; UNECE Consultant
Contributing members from the UNECE nexus on sustainable and smart cities for all ages:
Ms. Monika Linn ��������������������������������������������� Project Leader, Chief, Sustainable Development and Gender Unit
Ms. Paola Deda ���������������������������������������������� Director, Forests, Land and Housing Division
Mr. Scott Foster ���������������������������������������������� Director, Sustainable Energy Division
Mr. Tony Bonnici ��������������������������������������������� Economic Affairs Officer, Cooperation and Partnerships Section
Mr. Francesco Dionori ��������������������������������� Chief, Transport Section and Secretary of the Working Party on
Rail Transport
Mr. Anders Jönsson ��������������������������������������� Chief, Innovative Policies Development Section
Ms. Vitalija Gaucaite Wittich ��������������������� Chief, Population Unit, Statistical Division
Ms. Gulnara Roll ��������������������������������������������� Secretary to the Committee on Urban Development, Housing and
Land Management, Forests, Land and Housing Division
Ms. Lorenza Jachia ���������������������������������������� Secretary to the Working Party on Regulatory Cooperation and
Standardization Policies, Economic Cooperation and Trade Division
Ms. Franziska Hirsch ������������������������������������ Secretary to the Convention on the Transboundary Effects of
Industrial Accidents, Environment Division
Mr. Roel Janssens ������������������������������������������ Economic Affairs Officer, Transport Division
Editors:
Ms. Cecilia Batac ��������������������������������������������� Statistics Assistant, UNECE
Mr. Max Goodall ��������������������������������������������� Consultant
The following consultants have also contributed to the preparation of the study:
Ms. Nadiia Yeremenko
Ms. Rebecca Wardle
Mr. Fabio El Khoury
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ABBREVIATIONS
BIM �������������������������������������������� Building Information Modelling
CO2 �������������������������������������������� Carbon Dioxide
ECE �������������������������������������������� Economic Commission for Europe
EIA ��������������������������������������������� Environmental impact assessment
ESPON �������������������������������������� European Territorial Observatory Network
EU ����������������������������������������������� European Union
EU15 ����������������������������������������� Countries which joined the European Union prior to the 2004 enlargement
GDP �������������������������������������������� Gross Domestic Product
GHG ������������������������������������������ Greenhouse Gases
GHSL ����������������������������������������� Global Human Settlement Layer
GIS ��������������������������������������������� Geographical Information Systems
GIZ ��������������������������������������������� Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit
GPS �������������������������������������������� Global Positioning System
GVA �������������������������������������������� Gross value added
ICT ��������������������������������������������� Information and Communication Technology
ICLEI ������������������������������������������ International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives
ITU ��������������������������������������������� International Telecommunication Union
JRC �������������������������������������������� Joint Research Centre for the European Commission
JTM �������������������������������������������� Just Transition Mechanism
NaTech �������������������������������������� Natural hazards triggering technological disasters
NDC ������������������������������������������ Nationally determined contributions
OECD ����������������������������������������� Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development
OSCE ����������������������������������������� Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe
PPP �������������������������������������������� Purchasing Power Parity
PRTR ������������������������������������������ Kyiv Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers
SDGs ����������������������������������������� Sustainable Development Goals
SEA �������������������������������������������� UNECE Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment
SMEs ����������������������������������������� Small and medium enterprises
SSC �������������������������������������������� Smart Sustainable Cities
THE PEP ����������������������������������� Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme
U4SSC ��������������������������������������� United for Smart Sustainable Cities
UK ����������������������������������������������� United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
UN ��������������������������������������������� United Nations
UN DESA ����������������������������������� United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs
UN-Habitat ����������������������������� United Nations Human Settlement Programme
UNDP ����������������������������������������� United Nations Development Programme
UNFCCC ����������������������������������� United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
UNECE �������������������������������������� United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
UNDRR �������������������������������������� United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction
WHO ����������������������������������������� World Health Organization
WP.29 ����������������������������������������� World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulation
© UN PHOTO / MATIJA POTOCNIK
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
A cities-based approach to sustainable development
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development provides an ambitious and comprehensive plan of action with its 17
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To advance the 2030 Agenda, the United Nations Economic Commission for
Europe (UNECE) (see box 1) has adopted a “nexus” approach in its work, focusing on high-impact nexus areas where
multiple SDGs converge. This flagship publication is related to one of those high impact nexus areas: “Sustainable and
smart cities for all ages”.
This publication advocates a “cities-based” approach to sustainable development. This approach recognises the
central and integrating role that cities and urban living play in developing sustainability. As a dominant form of spatial
organization within society today, cities are the centrepiece of economic, social, and cultural life. Without localising
SDGs at the urban level, few can be effectively addressed at all. By their nature, cities represent a complex arrangement
of many interrelated systems, both social and technical, so that they are best placed to address multiple sustainability
goals at once. Cities also offer more rapid, practice-informed and grounded responses to sustainability challenges.
“People-smart sustainable cities” engage with sustainability in an inclusive, collaborative and equitable way. While
fostering sustainability across their environmental, economic, social and cultural dimensions, these cities provide
the necessary conditions and infrastructure to enhance the capabilities of their citizens to contribute to, and enjoy
the benefits of, a more liveable, resilient and sustainable urban development. These cities enable the meaningful
participation of citizens in fulfilling their right to the city; they focus on making cities more prosperous, equitable,
comfortable and innovative; they address social needs and make sure housing and urban services are high-quality and
affordable; they cater for the needs of the vulnerable and those with disabilities; and they are also gender-sensitive
and age-responsive, acknowledging the different and changing needs of residents at different stages of their life.
(a) Globalization and urbanization. These two processes support each other: globalization causes people move to
cities - with their benefits of agglomeration, while urbanization fosters economic and cultural interdependence
of the world and creates a planetary-wide ecological footprint.
(b) Geographic disparities. Besides the persistence of social inequalities, which produce issues with spatial
segregation, unequal standards of living and a lack of housing affordability within cities, large economic
inequalities exist between larger metropolitan areas and smaller, peripheral and old industrial cities, resulting
in an uneven quality of life and different life opportunities for their residents.
(c) Crises and pandemics. The financial crisis of 2008 and the outbreak of COVID-19 have contributed to new
global instabilities, intensifying underlying the economic and social problems of cities.
(d) Digital transitions. Information and communications technologies (ICTs) and the fourth industrial revolution
offer new opportunities for managing cities more efficiently and holistically and for enhancing wellbeing of
people and introduce new challenges to privacy and democracy.
(e) Population ageing. Ageing produces specific demands on urban infrastructure, health and social care system,
housing and public space, and expands the “silver economy”, which already makes up a considerable share of
urban economies.
(f ) Climatic and environmental challenges. As well as facing global transformations associated with climate
change and their inferences for energy transitions, cities are also faced with localized environmental pressures,
such as air, water and noise pollution, which influence public health.
(g) Natural and technological hazards. Urbanization decreases distances between population centres, industrial
areas, flood plains, seashores and other areas prone to the impacts of natural hazards and increases the
exposure of the population to technological hazards.
balancing programmes, mitigating economic inequalities and supporting areas which may be lagging behind. Yet,
many countries, including those with economies in transition, focus on large-scale urban projects, particularly in larger
and capital cities. More inclusive policies seek to externalise/share the benefits of larger metropolitan agglomerations
to benefit the whole urban system – whether through a redistributive hand of the state, territorial planning and
integration, a polycentric model of regional development or better connectivity and enabling infrastructure.
Climate-neutral cities
Thousands of cities have already incorporated climate and energy targets into their strategies and plans. These plans
create a sense of direction, even if these targets are more aspirational than binding. Trends are occurring almost
everywhere towards strengthening energy efficiency standards for new-built buildings and homes, providing energy
regeneration for existing buildings, and sharing expertise between cities (as, for example, facilitated by the UNECE
International Centres of Excellence on High-Performance Buildings). Cities are changing energy supply sources to
cleaner modes and modernising their energy infrastructure. Cities also have the power to do much through a focus
on transport, which remains predominantly based on fossil fuels. Municipal procurement for clean energy and green
technologies for public services and transport is an effective lever, alongside city planning and incentivizing shifts in
modes of travel of citizens.
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Tackling hazards
Natural, technological and hybrid hazards require preventive solutions as well as preparedness and response
measures. Due to the concentration of people, housing and capital stock, cities are particularly vulnerable to the
impacts of disasters. Following the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, key aspects for reducing negative
impacts are policy integration, improved adaptation and resilience. To achieve resilient urban environments,
concerted efforts by multiple stakeholders are required: to boost the internal capabilities of urban systems to prevent
disasters, to minimize their negative impacts if they do happen, and to make sure any post-disaster recovery activities
are coordinated, effective, people-centred, inclusive and focus on enhancing wellbeing and further resilience of cities
(the “building back better” principle). The UNECE Industrial Accidents Convention and the UNECE Water Convention,
promote the identification of technological and natural hazards and risk mitigation through the adoption of policies
for prevention, preparedness and response.
1 A CITIES-BASED APPROACH
TO SUSTAINABILITY
Sustainability calls for development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of
future generations to also meet their needs. It calls for the integration of economic development, social equity, and
environmental protection. It is the kind of development that puts people at the centre and that is just, equitable and
inclusive (UN DESA and UNDP, 2012).
The United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development provides an ambitious and comprehensive plan of
action. At the heart of it are 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which represent a blueprint for policymaking
and international cooperation. SDGs recognize that a sustainable future depends on how successfully multiple global
challenges will be addressed at once: ending poverty and other deprivations, improving health, education and
wellbeing, reducing inequality and spurring economic growth, preserving the environment, and tackling climate
change. The integrated character of the 2030 Agenda draws attention to linkages and complementarities among
many traditionally dispersed policy areas.
This publication takes the 2030 Agenda forward in a “cities-based approach” to sustainable development. This approach
aims to recognise the central and integrating role that cities play in addressing, initiating and governing sustainability.
As the dominant form of the spatial organization of society, cities are driving economic, social, and environmental
transformations. Consequently, cities can be, and already are, engines for directing these transformations towards
greater sustainability.
The key to successful sustainability transition is “innovation” (see box 2). Cities bring together industries, entrepreneurs,
research and education institutions, human capital, efficient infrastructure, a large diversity of consumer demand and
preferences, investors, accountable and reactive policy makers and public officials, culture and, importantly, different
kinds of talent. The concentration of all these elements in one place serves as fertile ground for innovative ideas to
create opportunities and ultimately resolve the sustainable development issues facing the world today, including
traffic congestion, energy and resource depletion, pollution, human health, waste management and affordable
housing. Cities function as hubs and testbeds in this respect, absorbing ideas, demonstrating their viability and
ensuring their transmission to the rest of the society. By systematically trying out different ideas and subsequently
scaling them up or diffusing them to the rest of society, cities drive the whole of society to a more sustainable future.
There are indications that without a close involvement of cities, few of the SDGs can be achieved at all. The 2030
Agenda particularly refers to cities within SDG 11: “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and
sustainable”. This goal covers areas such as housing and basic services, transport, urban planning and management,
national and regional development planning, cultural and natural heritage, urban resilience and environmental
impact of cities. However, cities can also act as catalysers for addressing the majority of other SDGs. This perspective,
where the role of cities is understood more broadly as bonding together different sustainability goals, is also central
to the New Urban Agenda, which was adopted by Habitat III in 2016 (see box 3).
Box 3: The New Urban Agenda and its implementation in the UNECE region
Urbanization as a new central force in broader civilizational development was outlined by the
New Urban Agenda adopted by Habitat III in 2016. This is a landmark document that sets out a
global vision for the development of cities in the next two decades, prior to the next Habitat
conference. UNECE has contributed to the development of the New Urban Agenda in a number
of important ways, including by preparing a Habitat III Regional Report for the UNECE region.
The key recommendations of the report were put directly into policy action by the Geneva
Ministerial Declaration on Sustainable Housing and Urban Development adopted by the heads of
delegations of UNECE member States in 2017.
Source: Habitat III (2016).
At the heart of the enormous potential of cities for sustainability are people – collectively and individually, living
today and those who will live tomorrow. Society certainly bears responsibility for the many challenges that our planet
is experiencing, but it is people who drive sustainability and are its ultimate source and beneficiaries. Recognising the
centrality of people in sustainable cities, this publication coins the vision for “people-smart sustainable cities”. People-
smart sustainable cities are those that engage with sustainability transitions in a people-first, inclusive, collaborative
and equitable way. This vision underscores the people-centred and integrated (cross-sectoral) approach of UNECE to
addressing the SDGs.
The innovative and transformational potential of cities should not be taken for granted, however. It is necessary that
this role for cities is explicitly recognised and promoted at all levels of government and that necessary mandates are
given to these different levels. The enabling of innovation involves a range of disparate factors, all of which must be
in place for a vibrant eco-system to emerge. This publication invites a sharp focus on cities and advocates considering
urban-based polices as a platform for integrating sustainability policies both across sectors and across different levels
of cooperation, from local to international.
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This is a necessarily inclusive and equitable perspective that directly and clearly links sustainable development with the
development of human capital, while also affirming the imperative of enhancing life opportunities and the quality of
life for all. Citizens are seen as both the source and beneficiaries of sustainable development. The foundation for these
ideas lies with the concepts of “sustainable cities” and “smart cities” (reviewed below). But the notion of people-smart
sustainable cities also focuses more sharply on human needs, capabilities and capacity building, while still inviting
stakeholders to engage in collaborative, inclusive and yet pragmatic politics for achieving sustainable development.
The creation of “sustainable cities” has been a main vision for urban development since the establishment of sustainable
development as a societal paradigm in the early 1990s. It is comprehensively defined as a policy commitment within
the New Urban Agenda. The sustainable city is considered to be the one that enhances and balances social, economic
and environmental dimensions. Different aspects and goals of urban sustainability are further stressed within the
New Urban Agenda: “just, safe, healthy, accessible, affordable, resilient and sustainable cities”. Sustainable cities often
interplay with a host of related normative visions for urban development. For example, cities should be at the same
time economically sound (productive cities, competitive cities, creative cities), socially responsive (inclusive cities,
liveable cities, just cities, age-friendly cities) and ecologically responsible (resource-efficient cities, green eco-cities,
resilient cities).
Ongoing digital transitions and the rise of smart technologies have made their impact on the conceptualization of
sustainable cities, bringing the “smart” dimension as a new claim to normativity for a technology-enhanced society.
Over the past two decades, “smart cities” and “intelligent cities” have proliferated as a way to build more efficient and
liveable urban environments. These acknowledge the role of ICT in making urban infrastructure and decision-making
and management systems more efficient, more environmentally friendly and more economically sensible. Smart
cities promise integration, efficiency, sustainability and people-centricity. In order to be smart, a city not only needs
a comprehensive commitment to using technology well, but also to transform governance, citizen interaction, and
value creation across the board. The success of smart city projects is not determined by technology or technical capital
alone; success is dependent on leadership, inter-organizational coordination and citizen engagement. The active
involvement of stakeholders – including citizens – in the co-creation and implementation of smart city solutions is
important for improving transparency and incentivizing society towards more sustainable practices and behaviours.
A concept that has emerged in association with the vision of “smart cities” is that of a “smart sustainable city”. The
International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and UNECE worked together to define a smart sustainable city as “an
innovative city that uses information and communication technologies and other means to improve quality of life,
efficiency of urban operation and services, and competitiveness, while ensuring that it meets the needs of present
and future generations with respect to economic, social, environmental as well as cultural aspects”. According to this,
smart sustainable cities use technology to build strong relationships between citizens and city governments so that
all citizens can benefit from, and even co-create public services (World Bank, 2015a) (see box 4).
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has developed a number of protocols for smart and
sustainable cities. For example, ISO 37106:2018 “Sustainable cities and communities — Guidance on establishing
smart city operating models for sustainable communities” gives guidance for leaders in smart cities and communities
on how to develop an open, collaborative, citizen-centric and digitally-enabled operating model for their city that
puts its vision for a sustainable future into operation. The document does not describe a one size fits all model for
the future of cities. Rather, the focus is on the enabling processes by which innovative use of technology and data,
coupled with organizational change, can help each city deliver its own specific vision for a sustainable future in more
efficient, effective and agile ways.
The technology-centred “smart city” vision is not without its problems and dilemmas, however. The concept has been
critiqued for its tendency to glorify technology, where urban citizens become subordinate to, rather than placed at
the heart of, a sustainable city project. A systematic review of literature on the subject notes:
Complexities involved in developing truly smart cities are pushing policymakers to opt for short-term wins
implementing Black Box technology solutions promoted by technology companies… While in theory smart is
seen as inclusive of the sustainability goals, in practice, the smart and sustainable notions have often been used
merely as window-dressing or reduced to ancillary aspect… In smart city projects, rather than producing new
visions for the “good city”, the focus has shifted to mainly generating technocentric solutions for cities (Yigitcanlar,
T. et al., 2019: pp. 359-360).
The concept of the “smart city” has morphed over time: it has experienced a notable shift from what some call now
Smart City 1.0 (characterised by a top-down framework, with a focus on ICT infrastructure and deploying solutions
promoted by technological companies) to Smart City 2.0 (a people-focused, users-friendly framework) to Smart City
3.0 (a framework for inclusive and participatory urban governance, even if still technology-enhanced). In terms of
technologies, instead of uncritical deployment and copying what other cities are doing, there is now a search for
“actually-smart” city solutions that are tailored to the very specific needs of individual cities and their communities
with specific characteristics, aspirations, and challenges. This approach is also coordinated with the concept of
adaptive governance discussed in Chapter 4.
Smartness is certainly one of the enabling conditions for improving sustainable development, but at its core must be
people, citizens, and communities. In this present publication, under the notion of people-smart sustainable cities,
smartness is taken as a decisively “humanistic” vision: inclusive of, but not limited to, and stretching far beyond, ICT or
technology. Rather, the notion of people-smart sustainable city advocates a broader understanding of smartness in
city development as a set of capabilities-enhancing conditions directed at sustainability and focused on generating a
harmonious society and improving quality of life. This means reducing gaps in capacity and efficiency, meeting social
needs, and making cities more conducive to innovation and more attractive to people and businesses.
This approach will drive through the rest of this publication, which will focus on how to create those enabling
conditions that make cities people-smart and create pathways towards more sustainable and liveable futures. This is
also to demonstrate that cities are key forces for implementing and innovating towards sustainable futures.
5
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
© DEPOSITPHOTOS
© DEPOSITPHOTOS
7
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Cities already represent the core social and economic assets and engines in all countries (including in those where
the population is still predominantly non-urban). This is due in large part to economic and cultural globalization.
Globalization is driven by advancements in telecommunication, digital technologies, transport systems as well as
trade liberalization. These advancements “shrink” the world, making it “smaller” in terms of the speed of information
and material flows across the globe. But simultaneously globalization creates its own demand for an increased speed
of social and economic interactions, making people move to cities, particularly larger cities, with their benefits of
proximity, accessibility and remarkable productivity. Productivity of cities is driven by agglomeration benefits,
economies of scale, knowledge sharing, business synergies, access to jobs, finance, entertainment, media, arts and
other services. Competitive and attractive cities drive job growth, incomes and productivity, even if there is a huge
variation in performance (World Bank, 2015b).
Globalization thus remakes geography, both global and local, strengthening the urban hierarchy with the larger
metropolitan areas benefiting as hubs of globalization - although all cities in the urban hierarchy play their part in the
architecture of the new economic geography. As will be discussed in section 2.2, this process widens the gap between
strong and weak cities and increases geographically uneven development. The other side to this process, however,
is that larger and more globally integrated cities are also those that are at the forefront of shocks related to negative
impacts of globalization, as demonstrated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The key regional focus of this publication is the UNECE region, which is already highly urbanized. The UNECE region
is home to 17 per cent of the world population. With over 75 per cent of the population of the region already living
in urban areas (as officially defined by the member States), this is where the social, intellectual and economic power
of the region is concentrated (see figure 1). The UNECE region is also a leader in sustainable urbanism and is home
to many cities that are leading the way in becoming smart and sustainable and making significant contributions to
sustainable development overall.
The fundamental role of cities in driving societal development must be contextualised within the broader mega-
social trends and challenges that cities must adapt to as these trends and challenges produce new opportunities.
These societal trends lead to the creation of new functions for cities in society. The key challenges are introduced
below.
8
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Figure 1. Percentage of the population residing in urban areas: United Nations forecast for 2020
andFigure
2050 1: Percentage of the population residing in urban areas: United Nations forecast for 2020 and 2050
100 100
2050
90 90
2020
80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
20 20
10 10
0 0
Bosnia and…
Ukraine
Croatia
Latvia
Denmark
Tajikistan
Moldova
Armenia
Montenegro
Belarus
Malta
Slovakia
Austria
Germany
Greece
Romania
Slovenia
North Macedonia
Portugal
Russian Federation
Spain
France
Poland
Lithuania
Norway
San Marino
Hungary
Switzerland
Turkey
Sweden
Luxembourg
Kyrgyzstan
Uzbekistan
Georgia
Albania
USA
Belgium
Serbia
Ireland
Italy
Canada
Finland
Netherlands
Israel
Estonia
Bulgaria
Iceland
Kazakhstan
United Kingdom
Andorra
UNECE Total
Liechtenstein
Czech Republic
Turkmenistan
Azerbaijan
Source: Based on the database of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA, 2018).
Source: Based on the database of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs
Note: The definition of urban areas based on national classifications.
(UN DESA, 2018).
Note: The definition of urban areas based on national classifications.
2.2 Geographical disparities
2.2. Geographical disparities
There is a great diversity of economic conditions across the world and across the UNECE region, defined by different
There is a of
legacies great diversity
previous of economic
development conditions
and investment, across
different the worldand
circumstances and acrossdevelopment
different the UNECEpathways.
region, An
important dimension of the UNECE region is a large group of countries that have experienced
defined by different legacies of previous development and investment, different circumstances and a transition from a form
of statedevelopment
different socialism to capitalist economies.
pathways. Regional economic
An important dimension dataof
illustrates that the
the UNECE majority
region is aof large
Central, Eastern
group ofand
South-Eastern Europe cities still lag behind the EU-28 average in term of productivity and innovation (Kollar, Bubbico
countries that have experienced a transition from a form of state socialism to capitalist economies.
and Arsalides, 2018). However, these countries vary greatly between themselves, including with respect to the levels
Regional economic data illustrates that the majority of Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe
of economic development (see figure 2).
cities still lag behind the EU-28 average in term of productivity and innovation (Kollar, Bubbico and
Arsalides, 2018). However,
Within nations, diversions inthese countries development
socio-economic vary greatly are
between themselves,
wide and including
persistent too; with respect
each country has its own
“core-periphery divide”. Globalization, alongside
to the levels of economic development (see figure 2). the processes of welfare state restructuring and a shift towards
a much more open economic model since the end of the 1970s, has increased the socio-economic gap between
cities in different locations, functions and size. Large cities that offer agglomeration and network advantages (larger
Within nations, diversions in socio-economic development are wide and persistent too; each country
markets, demand and labour pool) enjoy substantial privileges over smaller cities. This uneven development is further
has underpinned
its own “core-periphery divide”. Globalization, alongside the processes of welfare state
by factors such as deindustrialisation in Europe and North America and is manifested in the increased
restructuring and a shift towards
dominance of larger and capital citiesa much more
and the open
decline economic
of many of the model since
smaller “old the endcities
industrial” of the
(see1970s,
box 5). has
increased the socio-economic gap between cities in different locations, functions and size. Large cities
thatDespite this, in the majority
offer agglomeration of cases
and it is these
network smaller and(larger
advantages old industrial
markets,places that contain
demand andthe majority
labour of theenjoy
pool) national
population. Figure 3 demonstrates, using the example of the 12 largest UNECE countries in terms of population, that
substantial privileges over smaller cities. This uneven development is further underpinned by factors
urban population is not necessarily concentrated in a few large metropolitan areas, but is distributed across multiple
such as deindustrialisation in Europe and North America and is manifested in the increased dominance
smaller cities. Smaller cities are thus equally, if not more, important for sustainable development than the largest ones.
of larger and capital cities and the decline of many of the smaller “old industrial” cities (see box 5).
Despite this, in the majority of cases it is these smaller and old industrial places that contain the
majority of the national population. Figure 3 demonstrates, using the example of the 12 largest UNECE
countries in terms of population, that urban population is not necessarily concentrated in a few large
metropolitan areas, but is distributed across multiple smaller cities. Smaller cities are thus equally, if
not more, important for sustainable development than the largest ones.
9
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Figure 2: GDP PPP* per capita in ex-socialist countries compared to the world, European Union and China, 2019
45,000
40,000
35,000
30,000
25,000
20,000
15,000
10,000
5,000
0
Hungary
Wo rld
European Union
Kazakhstan
Tajikistan
Slovak Republic
Belarus
Slovenia
Serbia
Lithuania
Estonia
Latvia
Romania
Croatia
China
Georgia
Albania
Armenia
Moldova
Bulgaria
North Macedonia
Poland
Uzbekistan
Kyrgyzstan
Russian Federation
Czech Republic
Ukraine
Montenegro
socialist) economies as an instrument for a more equitable regional development, with a combined
goal of industrialisation and economic equalisation.
ManyBoxmonotowns
5: Urbanwere newly built, often
deindustrialization in remote (continued)
and monotowns locations. The establishment of such towns was
heavily funded alongside major industrial programmes, frequently in areas of energy generation and
Many monotowns were newly built, often in remote locations. The establishment of such towns was heavily funded
resource
alongside major industrial programmes, frequently in areas of energyindustrial
extraction. According to the paradigm of “territorial generationcomplexes”, monotowns
and resource extraction. According to
worked closely together as part of a united yet spatially distributed “factory”. Their highly specialized
the paradigm of “territorial industrial complexes”, monotowns worked closely together as part of a united yet spatially
economies complemented
distributed “factory”. Theireach
highlyother with the
specialized supportcomplemented
economies of large-scale infrastructure
each and
other with the intensive
support of large-scale
transport flows.
infrastructure and intensive transport flows.
Following
Following thethedismantling
dismantling ofofthe planned
the economy,
planned exposure
economy, to the international
exposure markets, privatization
to the international of economic
markets,
privatization of economic assets, disintegration of industrial supply chains and increased transportdivergent
assets, disintegration of industrial supply chains and increased transport costs, monotowns have followed
costs,trajectories.
monotowns While centres
have of export-oriented
followed divergent industry (e.g. oil
trajectories. or metals)
While or state-funded
centres economy (e.g.
of export-oriented science towns
industry
(e.g. oil or metals) or state-funded economy (e.g. science towns or nuclear plant towns) continue toeconomic
or nuclear plant towns) continue to flourish, others, especially smaller and remote cities, have experienced
decline
flourish, and shrinkage
others, similar
especially to old industrial
smaller and remote cities cities,
in Westernhave Europe and North America.
experienced economic Such towns constitute,
decline and for
instance, 25-30 per cent of the total number of cities in countries like Russia and Ukraine.
shrinkage similar to old industrial cities in Western Europe and North America. Such towns constitute,
for instance, 25-30 per cent of the total number of cities in countries Sources:like Russiaetand
Golubchikov Ukraine.
al. (2015); Restrepo Cadavid et al. (2017).
Figure
Figure 3.3: Distribution
Distribution of urban
of urban populationby
population by settlement
settlement size,
size,2015
2015
100%
Urban clusters
90% (below 50,000)
60%
250,000 - 500,000
50%
500,000 - 1,000,000
40%
1,000,000-5,000,000
30%
10%
0%
USA Russia Germany Turkey UK France Italy Spain Ukraine Poland Canada Uzbekistan
Source: Joint Research Centre (JRC) degree of urbanization database (JRC, 2015).
Source:
Notes: Joint
Countries Research
included Centre
are UNECE (JRC)
member degree
States of urbanization
with over database
30 million inhabitants, (JRC, 2015).
in decreasing order of total population size. Data were
calculated based on JRC internationally harmonized “degree of urbanization” data for functional “urban centres” (cities with over 50,000
Notes: Countries included are UNECE member States with over 30 million inhabitants, in increasing
inhabitants) and “urban clusters” (mostly towns and suburbs). An urban centre consists of contiguous grid cells of one km2 with a density of at
order of total
least 1,500 population
inhabitants per km2 size. Data were
and a minimum totalcalculated
population ofbased
50,000.on JRC internationally
An urban harmonized
cluster consists of contiguous “degree
grid cells of one km2 with
ofa urbanization” data
density of at least 300 for functional
inhabitants “urban
per km and centres”
a minimum (cities with
total population over
of 5,000. This50,000 inhabitants)
methodology and national
is different from “urbanstatistics for
administrative
clusters” units. towns and suburbs). An urban centre consists of contiguous grid cells of one km2
(mostly
with a density of at least 1,500 inhabitants per km2 and a minimum total population of 50,000. An
Relative
urban economic
cluster consistsperformance,
of contiguousjobs
gridopportunities and
cells of one km 2 salary are some of the indicators often revealing inter-
with a density of at least 300 inhabitants per
kmurban
and inequalities
a minimumand totalthe consequences
population of this
of 5,000. often
This spiral in their
methodology effects. For
is different example,
from a continuing
national statistics economic
underperformance
for of a city and a lack of economic opportunities lead to a drain of talent, skills and jobs to other
administrative units.
places. This reduces the ability of public and private sectors to support the fiscal health of the locality, as well as
its service provision and infrastructure. This, consequentially, leads to lower levels of business development and
innovation. Over time, the qualitative and quantitative differentiation between places only increases,24 bringing in
uneven quality of life.
11
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
While some ideological propositions may consider this in naturalistic terms as “the survival of the fittest” and that
people “vote with their feet”, the consequence is that those overwhelming majorities of citizens that vote to stay
rather than go are deprived of their capabilities to realise their potential and wellbeing in comparison with their
peers in “successful” cities. This can be seen as “spatial” or “territorial injustice”, contradicting the ethos of sustainability,
whereby core places are systematically advantaged – economically, culturally and/or politically – compared to
peripheries.
Related to this is the phenomenon of shrinking cities. These are cities that are experiencing a long-term loss of
population. This is a relative process; shrinkage has different intensities for different cities and happens alongside
growth in other cities that are attracting population. “Urban shrinkage” is the result of an interplay of national
demographic trends and subnational uneven development; it is more likely to happen in countries with a declining
population overall. Among the countries of the world that are already shrinking or are projected to lose substantial
parts of their population in the coming 20 years, almost all are situated in the UNECE region, mostly in Eastern
Europe. Over 60 per cent of cities analysed by a World Bank study in Eastern Europe and Central Asia have declined
in population in the period of 2000-2010 (Restrepo Cadavid et al., 2017). This occurs mainly in smaller cities, although
even larger cities may be affected depending on their economic structure and location. Impacts of urban shrinkage
include declining tax revenues, rising unemployment, outward migration of the working-age population, surplus
land and buildings, and an oversized physical infrastructure (UNECE and HABITAT III, 2016: p.19). All this is happening
against the continuing growth and expansion of “stronger” cities (see box 6 and section 3.1).
Box 6: The Geneva Ministerial Declaration on Sustainable Housing and Urban Development
The Geneva Ministerial Declaration on Sustainable Housing and Urban Development adopted by the heads of delegations
of UNECE member States in 2017, followed the publication of the Habitat III Regional Report for the UNECE region. The
Ministerial Declaration serves as a high-level mechanism to mobilise governments and stakeholders to address key
urban development and housing challenges across the UNECE region. The Declaration builds on the key principles of the
Habitat III Regional Report and develops a number of new policy articulations with regard to overcoming geographical
disparities in the region. For example, the Declaration asserts the importance of addressing social and spatial inequality
within and among the cities of the UNECE region, reducing the economic polarization in growing cities that results from
housing market imbalances and promoting inclusive cities by addressing the multiple integrated aspects of housing,
urban poverty and exclusion. It also recognises specific challenges faced in the eastern part of the region, including
the need for reforms in the spheres of large housing estates, energy efficiency, and company towns (monotowns).
UNECE works towards the implementation of the Declaration through everyday activities on policy development and
strengthening the capacity of national and local governments.
Source: UNECE (2017b).
Like the financial crisis of 2008, COVID-19 has demonstrated the importance for cities to be more flexible and to
develop “resilience”, that is, the ability to withstand different kinds of shocks, of different nature and to adapt and
recover from them in a way that doesn’t threaten the functioning, wellbeing and prosperity of the city, at least in
the medium term. However, both crises have also highlighted the conditions of structurally uneven resilience (when
different cities have different capacities to cope with the crisis). Crises are never the same across multiple places.
The financial crisis of 2008 produced particularly strong and long-lasting negative implications in already economically
weaker cities, which found themselves less resilient, suffering from decreased public budgets, caps on public spending,
and growing social and economic inequalities. Are the consequences of the crisis associated with COVID-19 different,
that is, more “inclusive” of larger and stronger metropolises?
On the one hand, the COVID-19 pandemic infiltrated different nations through mega and large cities; their airports
serve as gateways to the world and they have larger pools of interconnected population through which a virus can
spread. The other key determinants of high rates of infection – density, percentage of foreign residents, age, presence
of global supply chains, and reliance on tourism and hospitality (DeVol, 2020) – are all combined and peak in mega
cities. The economic impact of the lockdown on these larger cities has also been more obvious because of their
sheer share of the total economic pie. Cities like New York, Milano, Madrid, London, Paris and Moscow were all at the
national epicentre of the coronavirus from the onset. They witnessed thousands of deaths, thousands of businesses
closed and tens of thousands have lost their jobs. New York City alone stands to lose up to USD 6 billion in tax revenue
(Harris, 2020).
Not only are the economic consequences of COVID-19 lockdown likely to far exceed those of the financial crisis of
2008, but also likely to affect the poorest much more. This is because lockdown measures have seriously affected
those with precarious, temporary employment or those relying on informal activities in the domestic, low value
added, already financially fragile service sector directly affected by lockdown restrictions. Cities have to deal with
large social problems that will require substantial transfers to mitigate the harm, especially in poorer countries with
severe fiscal constraints. COVID-19 is also to have a more lasting economic impact on economically weaker cities.
While the recovery of larger centres is more imminent, weaker cities have interconnected underlying problems which
cumulatively undermine their capacities to cope with a crisis, exacerbating the impact of each new shock.
Overall, the spread of coronavirus and the effects of containment measures have exacerbated pre-existing social,
spatial and economic inequality. Both the disease itself and the economic plight caused by lockdown measures have
disproportionally affected the most vulnerable groups of the society: senior citizens, low-income families, homeless
people, people living in overcrowded apartments, large families with children, people with disabilities, immigrants,
refugees and minority groups. These groups suffer from limited access to healthcare, fuel poverty or inflation of the
prices of essential goods and services.
The impacts on vulnerable groups have been particularly strong in those societies which are also traditionally spatially
segregated. For example, government statistics in the United Kingdom (UK) identified that amidst the peak of the
COVID-19 outbreak in March 2020 people living in more deprived areas had experienced mortality rates (i.e. deaths
involving COVID-19 per 100,000 people) more than double those living in less deprived areas (Office of National
Statistics UK, 2020). Similarly, data from the US highlighted a strong spatial-racial divide. If measured relative to the
total population of the race group, African Americans were twice as likely to die from the disease as their Caucasian,
Latino and Asian American compatriots. In some States, including Washington D.C., the death rate exceeded six times
higher for African Americans than Caucasians (Pilkington, 2020; APM Research Lab Staff, 2020). Out of the 10 ZIP codes
with the highest death rates in New York City, eight had populations that were predominantly African Americans or
Latino (Schwirtz, 2020). The most affected groups of the population are more likely to have lower levels of overall
health and underlying health conditions (such as diabetes, hypertension and obesity); are disadvantaged in terms
of access to diagnostic testing and high-quality health care; and are more likely to rely on precarious employment in
lockdown-affected sectors.
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
The deep sense of this transformation is captured in the notion of the “fourth industrial revolution”, which some claim
is already changing the way in which economies and societies are organized and operate. This is underpinned by
technological elements such as big data, the internet of things (IoT), artificial intelligence, machine learning, robotics,
autonomous vehicles, dematerialization and others.
Most of these trends are more pronounced in cities due to the concentration of demand in these contexts. Technical
innovation and ICTs offer new opportunities for managing cities more effectively and holistically and transitioning
towards “smart cities”. Technologies such as high-speed internet, 5G mobile networks, IoT and big data play an
increasingly important role in sustainability innovation.
Cities have a broad range of applications at their disposal that they can tailor to support initiatives. These include
smart buildings, smart water management, intelligent transport systems, and new ideas to enhance efficiency in
energy consumption and waste management. These initiatives further promote interaction of governments and
service providers with the public, public participation in decision-making, awareness-raising and transparency. Smart
cities can use technology to build strong relationships between citizens and city governments that all citizens can
benefit from and facilitating citizens to even co-create public services. Citizens commonly have access to a large
variety of services just in their pockets, that is, through electronic devices (see table 1 and section 3.3).
Congested transport AVs allow more efficient use of transport infrastructure and can radically reduce the
infrastructure in growing demand for parking in central areas and free up valuable space for housing and recreation.
cities
Automated traffic control systems making use of AI and real-life sensor information.
UAVs exploit underused urban airspace.
Low carbon energy networks Automation enables buildings and infrastructure to respond to climate change
and ecological management (e.g. regulating energy use and comfort, air quality).
Sensors and AI can underpin the development and management of green infrastructure.
Assisted living for an ageing Automated and robotic health and social care support assisted living. Scope to extend
population and inclusion age-friendly urban environments.
AVs extend personal mobility.
Infrastructure maintenance More efficient monitoring, repair and control through robotics, especially in contexts
and repair where human accessibility is difficult or unpleasant.
Controlled internal Automation and AI provide the climate control needed to manage advances in controlled
environments for leisure internal environments for food growing and leisure.
and food
Urban security and policing UAVs and automated robotic policing help extend policing and surveillance.
Source: Adapted from UK-RAS (Marvin et al., 2018: p.10).
Abbreviations: AV, automatic autonomous vehicle; AI, artificial intelligence; UAV, unmanned aerial vehicle.
14
PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
There are certainly many risks and unknowns on these pathways to digitalization, some of which will be discussed
later in this publication. These include privacy concerns, risks to traditional businesses and exploitative tendencies
of sharing economy platform monopolists. Concerns about mass surveillance have become pronounced during the
COVID-19 outbreak (see box 7 and box 8). The gig economy itself is a symptom of a broader change in a direction
that opens up many opportunities, but also subjects people to new risks including more precarious and uncertain
jobs. This, in turn, requires policymakers to experiment with new ways of formulating social policy in order to mitigate
negative effects and channel effective investment into human capital. Cities may prove to be perfect venues for doing
this in a novel and creative way.
While the 56 UNECE countries collectively account for 17 per cent of world population, they host 31 per cent of the
population aged 65 years or older. At the turn of the 21st century, 14 per cent of the urban population in Europe were
65 years old and above, the share had grown to 17 per cent by 2015; in North America, the proportion increased from
12 per cent to 14 per cent (UNECE, 2020a). This trend has both challenges and potential. An ageing population is
generated by a combination of low fertility and increased life expectancy and denotes a shift in the composition of
the age of population towards the older generation. The trends are pronounced in cities.
The spread of COVID-19 has shown the effects of an ageing population to be a growing vulnerability for cities in
the UNECE region. Older people have found themselves at higher risk of developing health complications, as such
countries and cities with ageing populations have been particularly badly affected by the outbreak – as exemplified
by Italy where the factor of population ageing has been coupled with active intergenerational exchange and densely
populated urban centres.
Indeed, the most “aged” subregion is EU15 countries (i.e. the EU member States prior to the accession of ten new
countries in 2004), in particular Germany and Italy. However, many others are catching up fast. The fastest rates of
population ageing are occurring in Eastern Europe and the Western Balkans where populations are declining due
to high out-migration flows coupled with low fertility. In contrast, countries in Central Asia, such as Azerbaijan and
Kazakhstan, demonstrate a divergent pattern. They have higher fertility rates and a relatively young population.
However, even these countries experience tendencies towards population ageing as life expectancy of their
population increases.
Population ageing has a direct impact on cities by changing their demographic makeup, as well as potentially
impacting the share of population that is working age, with further impacts therefore generated on employment-
related tax revenues. Population ageing also produces specific demands on urban infrastructure, health and social
care systems, housing and public spaces. It is not only that the total demand on housing increases as people live
longer, but housing conditions and urban design must develop to meet the specific needs of the older generation,
particularly with regard to the provision of adult services such as assisted living, as well as more general issues of
mobility, accessibility and assistance.
However, all of this also opens up opportunities to cities. Firstly, ageing does not necessarily need to diminish the
urban tax base; later retirement age and post-retirement participation in labour market are both picking up in many
countries. VAT/sales tax (that makes up a substantial part of the revenue of the city) is charged the same for the older
people and in many countries, pensions are not exempt from income tax either.
Secondly, the older population also ensures demand and room for new businesses, leading to what has become
known as the “silver economy”. This economy plays a vital role in a diverse range of sectors. Some estimates suggest
that the silver economy, involving those who are 50 years old or older, contributes about 30 per cent of EU GVA (gross
value added) (Varnai et al, 2018). The main portion of spending by the silver economy is on housing and utilities,
which is well concentrated in urban areas. In fact, many urban services, industries and jobs – both public and private
– rely heavily on the silver economy. For example, food, health, pharmacies, insurance, banking, transport and leisure
among others. The New Urban Agenda, for example, recognises the imperative of “harnessing the ageing factor as
an opportunity for new decent jobs and sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, while improving the
quality of life of the urban population”.
Thirdly, as will be further demonstrated throughout this publication, a search for new solutions to cater for the
heterogeneous needs and wants of older population opens new opportunities and innovation for “smart ageing”
(see box 9). For example, an important aspect of this is enhancing the opportunities of “ageing in place”. This is the
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
ability of older people to continue living in their own home and community - securely, safely, independently, and
comfortably - without the need to change their place of residence (for example, to move to a care home) due to illness
or inability to manage own life independently (UNECE, 2020d). There is a strong evidence that older people prefer to
stay in their existing home where they feel having more autonomy, dignity and security, while staying close to their
local community gives them a sense of identity, connection and familiarity. Technology, telemedicine and assisted
homes can radically reformat the relationships between elderly care and places of residence, giving older people the
chance to stay in their own home and community as much as possible, rather than to moving into care or nursing
homes (see sections 3.3 and 3.4).
The outbreak of COVID-19 has further reasserted the importance of rethinking the arrangement of care for the most
vulnerable groups within the older population. In the rich countries by mid-2020:
Nearly half of all deaths from COVID-19 have happened in care and nursing homes, even though less than 1 per cent
of people live in them. In Canada 80 per cent of all the deaths from COVID-19 have happened in [such] places… In
Britain the pathogen has killed an estimated 5 per cent of all people living in such institutions. The problem is not
only that the residents’ age makes them particularly vulnerable, but also that their living arrangements created
opportunities for the virus to spread. Countries with fewer care homes have had fewer COVID-19 deaths, all else
being equal (The Economist, 2020a).
Besides ageing, demographic shifts also include regional trends with respect to migration, population diversification
(including ethnical diversity but also lifestyle choices) and changing family structures (smaller families with more
people living in a single single-person household, particularly older women and younger generation). These shifts
put further pressure on housing in cities, as well as increasing the importance of catering to different lifestyles and
social and cultural diversity.
“Climate change” refers to rising global temperatures and the extreme environmental impacts caused by this, as well
as the global consensus on the anthropogenic origin of this phenomenon – i.e. as a result of the intensified emissions
of GHG. The Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is
currently the major framework regulating international efforts to combat climate change through creating a pathway
towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development (see box 10). EU countries, for example,
have committed to cut net GHG emissions to net-zero by 2050. This policy landscape puts serious pressure and
expectations on cities. Cities need to be future-proofed for climate change, directly for the impacts of climate change
and extreme events associated with it, but also indirectly for more demanding requirements with regard to climate
policy coming as part of national and international regulation packages.
For most cities, the combustion of fossil fuels remains a major source of energy and the main source of GHG too. Cities
use energy for heating, cooling, lighting and for the operation of machines (including transport) and appliances.
Cities also consume energy embedded in the manufacturing of consumer goods, foodstuff and building materials.
Apart from carbon dioxide (CO2), another principal GHG is methane, which is particularly emitted from waste
decomposition and treatment, as well as food production. Cities are involved in combating climate change – “climate
change mitigation” - through policies such as the deployment of clean energy systems, reduced use of fossil fuel,
sustainable mobility, improved energy efficiency and sustainable methods of waste utilization and recycling (for
further details see section 3.5).
However, urban communities are also themselves vulnerable to climate change and its negative effects. These
include extreme weather events (floods, heatwaves), rising sea levels, melting permafrost (affecting cities in northern
areas), wildfires and droughts. Urban areas, concentrating people and infrastructure and often in hazard-prone
areas, experience some of the largest impacts from both gradual climatic changes and abrupt natural occurrences.
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Within cities, moreover, it is often poor and more disadvantaged people who suffer the most. Cities, therefore,
embrace socially oriented policies for climate adaptation and resilience as part of their sustainability policy packages
(see sections 3.5 and 3.8).
Besides global transformations associated with climate change, cities are dealing with local and regionalised
environmental issues, such as air, water and noise pollution, which are important factors influencing the quality of life
and public health in cities (see section 3.6). Through urban sprawl and land-use change, cities also contribute to the
loss of biodiversity and soil degradation.
Today, most cities take clean drinking water for granted. Yet, in the pan-European region alone, in both cities and
rural areas, about 19 million people still do not have access to clean and reliable water sources and 67 million people
lack access to improved sanitation facilities. About 100 million people do not have access to sanitation facilities at
home, which makes them vulnerable to water-related diseases, such as cholera, bacillary dysentery, coli infections,
viral hepatitis A and typhoid (UNECE, 2020f ).
Air pollution causes severe health problems throughout the UNECE region. Exposure to air pollution is biggest in
cities due to the concentration of traffic and industry. Exposure to poor air quality is especially high along busy roads,
near industrial sources or when many houses are heated with solid fuels (UNECE, 2018a). Transport is thus one of the
key sources of air and noise pollution in cities influencing health. The UNECE Transport, Health and Environment Pan-
European Programme (THE PEP) is an important framework mechanism to mitigate the negative impacts of transport
on health and environmental pollution (see box 11).
Box 11: Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP)
The Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP) is an example of an effective cross-sectoral
and people-smart approach. The Programme, which was established in 2002, encourages governments, at national
and local levels, to pursue an integrated approach to sustainable mobility. Through THE PEP, the transport, health and
environment sectors work together to find solutions to make cities more healthy, liveable and prosperous. THE PEP has
five priority goals:
(a) To contribute to sustainable economic development and stimulate job creation through investment in
environment- and health-friendly transport;
(b) To manage sustainable mobility and promote a more efficient transport system;
(c) To reduce emissions of transport-related greenhouse gases, air pollutants and noise;
(d) To promote policies and actions conducive to healthy and safe modes of transport;
(e) To integrate transport, health and environmental objectives into urban and spatial planning policies.
THE PEP covers, among other things, activities related to sustainable urban transport, health impacts of transport, mobility
management, cycling and walking as feasible non-motorised transport modes for urban areas, and consideration of
institutional arrangements for policy integration. The Paris Declaration - City in Motion: People First, adopted at the
fourth high-level meeting of THE PEP, further underlines the importance of placing citizens at the centre of decisions on
transport and mobility. The emphasis is on people-centred policies designed to make safe, healthy and green transport
choices accessible and affordable to all.
One of the recent flagship publications of THE PEP is A Handbook on Sustainable Urban Mobility and Spatial Planning
- Promoting Active Mobility (2020). It advocates integrating transport, health, quality of life and environmental
objectives into urban and spatial planning policies and puts forward a methodology for sustainable urban transport
planning. It provides references to case studies, good practices and examples from cities across the Euro-Asian region
(and beyond) covering a wide array of thematic areas. These include spatial planning in function of sustainable urban
mobility and accessibility; public transport planning; active mobility and how it promotes health and the environment;
and the potential of intelligent transport systems in an urban context.
Source: WHO Europe (2019).
social problems. One component of this is food waste. Cities multiply the food loss problem because
of their size, the constant need for food availability and relatively low cost of food, a low
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understanding
PEOPLE-SMART ofCITIES
SUSTAINABLE food production systems and their environmental impacts among the population,
and, in developing countries, the lack of refrigerated storage. Already now, food waste makes up a
considerable portion of waste produced in urban areas and creates a huge environmental, financial
and social problem for cities. At the same time, as will be demonstrated later, cities offer innovative
solutions
Waste to addressing
is another problems
significant concern related
for cities to food
because waste,
it creates hugeas well as other
environmental, typesand
financial of social
“waste” (see
problems.
section
One 3.7). of this is food waste. Cities multiply the food loss problem because of their size, the constant need
component
for food availability and relatively low cost of food, a low understanding of food production systems and their
2.7. Natural impacts
environmental and technological hazardsand, in developing countries, the lack of refrigerated storage. Already
among the population,
now, food waste makes up a considerable portion of waste produced in urban areas and creates a huge environmental,
financial and social problem for cities. At the same time, as will be demonstrated later, cities offer innovative solutions
Disaster risks posed to cities have multiple dimensions beyond those linked with climate change
to addressing problems related to food waste, as well as other types of “waste” (see section 3.7).
or
environmental pollutions. Urbanization decreases the distances between population centres,
industrial areas, flood plains, seashores and other areas prone to the impacts of natural hazards and
2.7 Natural
increases andthe
both technological
exposure and hazards
vulnerability of the population to disaster risk. There are also further
risks associated with terrorism. All of these may significantly undermine sustainable development.
Disaster risks posed to cities have multiple dimensions beyond those linked with climate change or environmental
pollutions. Urbanization decreases the distances between population centres, industrial areas, flood plains, seashores
In the
and otherdisaster riskto reduction
areas prone (DRR)
the impacts of terminology,
natural a “disaster”
hazards and increases both theisexposure
described as a hazardous
and vulnerability of the event
(triggeredtoby
population a natural
disaster or technological
risk. There are also furtherhazard) interacting
risks associated with theAllsocial
with terrorism. conditions
of these of exposure,
may significantly
undermine sustainable development.
vulnerability and capacity (see figure 4). “Hazards” may include natural hazards such as, for example,
earthquakes
In the disaster riskor landslides,
reduction as well asa technological
(DRR) terminology, hazards
“disaster” is described such asevent
as a hazardous industrial accidents.
(triggered by a naturalEven if
referred
or to as
technological a “natural”
hazard) interacting hazard or disaster,
with the social conditionsthe latter isvulnerability
of exposure, a mix ofandnaturalcapacityfactors
(see figureand
4). social
vulnerabilities. “Vulnerability” influences capacity of people to anticipate and cope with the negative
“Hazards” may include natural hazards such as, for example, earthquakes or landslides, as well as technological hazards
such as industrial accidents. Even if referred to as a “natural” hazard or disaster, the latter is a mix of natural factors and
impacts of hazards. Vulnerability of a city is a product of social, economic and political processes that
social vulnerabilities. “Vulnerability” influences capacity of people to anticipate and cope with the negative impacts
influence how hazards affect people in varying ways and with different intensities. Vulnerability
of hazards. Vulnerability of a city is a product of social, economic and political processes that influence how hazards
reflects,
affect peopleforin varying
example, wayssocial differentiation
and with across
different intensities. class, gender,
Vulnerability reflects, forethnicity, age differentiation
example, social groups, disability,
immigration
across status,
class, gender, as well
ethnicity, age as locational
groups, disability,characteristics.
immigration status, as well as locational characteristics.
Figure4: 4. The
Figure causation
The causation of disaster
of disaster risk risk
Source: United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Occupied Palestinian Territory
(OCHAOPT, 2017: p. 44).
35
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
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Thus, the adverse impacts of hazards are often more significant for vulnerable groups, who are more exposed to
hazards due to their limited access to material resources and safe living conditions and/or due to their limited
capacity to cope with the crisis. There is often a political reluctance to deal with these most important social and
economic factors behind a disaster because they are hardest to address. For example, “policies might include land
reform, enforcement of building codes and land-use restrictions, greater investment in public health, provision of a
clean water supply and improved transportation to isolated and poor regions of a country” (Wisner et al., 2004, p.9).
While regulation and new standards have driven significant progress in industrial safety, major technological disasters
such as industrial/chemical accidents still occur as countries face new challenges and emerging risks. For example,
from October 2016 to September 2017 alone, Asia, Europe and North America witnessed 620 accidents reported on
the media, associated with 552 deaths, mostly in Asia (UNDRR, 2019).
In recent years, many extreme weather-related events triggered industrial accidents with severe environmental
and economic consequences, such as Hurricane Harvey in the US. These events, known as “NaTech” (natural hazards
triggering technological disasters), are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change. Such natural,
technological and hybrid hazards require special prevention and protection as well as preparedness and response
measures at the city scale that concentrate on population and infrastructure, both of which can be put at risk (see
section 3.8).
The discussion above demonstrate some key challenges and opportunities that shape cities and society today. This
discussion brings with it some important questions: How can cities systematically address sustainability challenges?
How can cities utilize their “integrating” potential for sustainability transitions? How can urban innovation be shared
to benefit the broader society in line with the vision for people-smart sustainable cities?
The next chapter reviews selected policy areas and illustrates the role of cities in providing integrated policy solutions.
It will outline what solutions are being implemented in cities to address the challenges or embrace the opportunities
that are being generated by the trends discussed here.
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
The previous chapter demonstrates that economic inequalities, concentration and polarisation between cities are
persistent and represent a challenge for sustainability. This should be understood in the context of SDG 10: “Reduce
inequality within and among countries”. Geographical disparities exist not only between nations or at the urban/
rural divide, but also between metropolitan areas and more peripheral and old industrial cities. Territorial inequalities
have implications for social justice, since wellbeing of people is greatly dependent on the area in which they live. This
remains a limiting factor both for economic and social development and for innovation.
The “growth pole” theory stresses the multiple positive effects from the more successful and fast-growing metropolitan
areas for regional and national economies and, most notably, suggests that the economic successes of these areas
will eventually “trickle down” to the rest of the national economy, including to “catching-up” places. However, in the
absence of coherent government policies to that end, larger cities internalise much of their agglomeration benefits
and externalise many negative effects for the rest of their nation; these effects include skills drain and environmental
footprint. The territorial effects of development and under-development often become self-perpetuating and spiral,
meaning that successful “growth poles” reap all the benefits and continue to prosper, while many other areas become
associated with failure and deprivation and are pushed further to the periphery. There are also costs of agglomeration
in terms of congestion or issues with housing affordability and quality of life for low-income groups.
There is compelling evidence that greater levels of equality create stronger overall returns in terms of innovation,
wellbeing and prosperity. Many regional development policy models stress the importance of the state and other
actors in ensuring enabling conditions and capabilities for less “successful” cities and places to become more
prosperous and competitive (ESPON, 2012).
Economically advanced nations, including the EU as a bloc, spend considerable budgets on territorial balancing
programmes, mitigating economic differences. This is also important in light of SDG 8: “Promote sustained, inclusive
and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all”. The EU structural funds
are a key source of regional development in the new EU members States in Eastern Europe. However, these still tend
to focus on larger cities and more populous areas where benefits of individual measures are considered to have a
greater impact in terms of coverage. This addresses the problems of some areas but intensifies their socio-economic
distance from other places.
And yet many countries, including those with economies in transition, have less developed mechanisms for wealth
redistribution and feature greater levels of territorial inequalities, as they also do with social inequalities. This is due
to the serious limiting of the redistributive scope of the state during their transition to capitalism. Cities in these post-
socialist countries commonly share many similar challenges: increased polarisation between cities of different size
and specialisation with resultant sharp depopulation of many peripheral regions and cities (see box 12); fragmented
system of spatial planning; problems with the management and maintenance of large-scale housing estates; lack of
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
housing affordability and energy efficiency; and growing urban sprawl and ecological footprint (Golubchikov and
Badyina, 2016). Efforts in urban regeneration across the region so far have focused on large-scale “signature” projects
such as housing renovation in capital cities, mega-events or spectacular urbanism (Golubchikov, 2017; Salukvadze
and Golubchikov, 2016). This benefits only a handful of places; geographically selective investments of this kind are
insufficient to address multiple challenges across the whole region and achieve broader social and spatial cohesion.
Sustainable urbanism is a relational category: individual cities are not self-contained entities that can be “islands of
sustainability” in the sea of decline. Thinking of cities as self-contained and independent entities does not work for
sustainable development. What is important is to see each city as part of the whole national socio-economic systems
as well as broader ecological systems and shared sustainable development commitments. Bridging the development
gap requires sharing and diffusion, both horizontally (across space/the urban system) and vertically (between
different levels) and in a way that does not impede healthy competitiveness, entrepreneurialism and productivity.
Instead initiatives should activate the capabilities of each and every citizen irrespective of their place of living. This
requires a change from the “cities-centric approach” that privileges particular cities (especially those which are large
and successful) to a “cities-based approach” which involves a fair-sharing of the benefits of the more advanced cities
with wider society. It is important to externalise the benefits of larger urban agglomerations to benefit lagging behind
places, whether through the redistributive hand of the state (including with respect to guaranteeing the quality of
key societal functions such as education and healthcare), better spatial planning and a polycentric model of regional
development or through better connectivity.
In the context of the post COVID-19 world, more attention will be given to the “foundational” economies, where cities
play the key role. Cities, regions and municipalities have the local knowledge and the proximity to local citizens to
design and deliver public services and development strategies and these foundational assets need to be nurtured
and nourished if the pandemic is to be a portal to a better world (see box 13).
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Box 13: The foundational economy – a spatial strategy for everyone everywhere
The foundational economy (FE) refers to the social and material infrastructure that supports everyday life; and public
and collective goods and services that provide mundane essentials such as housing services, physical infrastructure,
retail banking, schools, food supply and health services.
Conventional ways of theorizing and measuring the competitive economy render the FE invisible and overlook its
contribution to development. Orthodox thinking is fixated on the contribution of hi-tech industries and property-
led regeneration to boost GDP. But growth in GDP is not translating into improvements in living standards for many
households and provides only a narrow and desiccated index of progress. The conventional debate also leaves
unanswered questions about the fate of the vast majority of people and places that do not feature in the narrow world
of innovation policy.
It is in this space that the FE concept makes its most important contribution because, far from being socially and
spatially exclusive, it has something to offer everyone everywhere, that is, to all citizens irrespective of their income
and location (Foundational Economy Collective, 2018). The FE includes “material infrastructure” – pipes and cables and
utility distribution systems for water, electricity, retail banking – and “providential services” – education, health, food
provisioning, dignified elder-care and income maintenance. It is the foundational economy that supplies goods and
services critical to rising living standards and social wellbeing, and that make a difference to quality of life of people
(Heslop, Morgan and Tomaney, 2019).
The COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated the importance of the foundational economy as the part of the economy
which cannot be shut down. The list of essential workers in each national economy provides a practical definition of
what counts as foundational (Foundational Economy Collective, 2020).
Wales in the UK became the first nation in the world to officially embrace the FE to deliver the sustainability goals of
its Wellbeing of Future Generations Act. To promote this agenda, Wales joined the Wellbeing Economy Governments
(WEGo) alliance with Scotland, Iceland and New Zealand. The rationale for this small nation alliance is to implement the
SDGs and to champion the idea that national success should be defined by the quality of life of citizens rather than the
growth rate of GDP of a country.
Promoting the FE in the post-pandemic world requires nothing less than a process of societal innovation for foundational
renewal in which two things are necessary: (a) citizens and consumers continue to view and value activity that has social
value; and (b) national and supra-national authorities work in concert with cities and regions in a spirit of co-production
rather than the top-down manner of the pre-pandemic era.
Contributor: Kevin Morgan, Cardiff University.
Each city is unique. The diffusion and transfer of best practice, models, knowledge and expertise are only good as long
as it can accommodate and take into account the diversity of urban contexts. Cities “are the communities, spaces and
political arenas through which change is invented, implemented, enacted and experienced in always specific and
different ways” (Rutherford and Coutard, 2014: p.1371). From this perspective sustainability transitions need to be
plural and heterogeneous; there is not one size fits all solution. Every city matters and every city is unique. Local actors
and local residents are best at understanding the particular needs of a city. Running through all that are imperative
for success in generating smart sustainable growth should be the thread of local collaborations between citizens,
business, academia and governments. (see box 14).
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
This is not for the first time that cities become the epicentres of communicable diseases; the Spanish flu killed tens
of millions of people almost exactly a century before COVID-19. Since then there have been a number of other large
disease outbreaks, although of smaller severity. Population density, as this and many other pandemics throughout
history have shown, makes transmission much easier. Historically, many argue, this has been the main impediment
to growth for the world as a whole. In the case of the Black Death, the disease killed 30-60 per cent of population.
Nothing of this scale has yet been seen with COVID-19 or other pandemics, but it does raise the question of what can
be done to balance the trade-offs.
Social distancing and other measures introduced by governments to restrict the spread of the virus question the very
essence of what urban life is about. Does this mean that we can see the beginning of the end of “the city” as we know
it? Does this mean at least the end of the sustainable city? Should urban sprawl - where the population is dispersed
across a larger area around urban cores and thus relies on cars for commuting to jobs and services – change its so far
highly negative connotation in sustainability discourses?
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
There are certainly multi-dimensional considerations related to future forms and functions of cities which come out
of the experience of the pandemic and concerns on how to minimize the spread of infection. For example, how
premises such as offices, houses and shops could be better designed; how public spaces, mobility and transportation
systems within cities could be better laid out; how cities should rethink their development, high streets and other
locational priorities; and whether the benefits of urban agglomeration could be replaced by distributed clusters
where physically dispersed activities are combined in digital space as “virtual agglomerations” (akin to virtual power
plants that aggregate the capacities of multiple energy producers with the help of smart grids).
Reaction of society to COVID-19, especially the rapid spread of teleworking, may change urbanization patterns.
Companies may see less reason to pay the huge premium for downtown offices and high salaries to compensate
workers for the cost of living. Real estate prices may even move backwards, or at least stagnate; and it will take some
time for these shifts to unfurl. From a city government perspective, this might mean also a rapid fall in tax revenue,
as more and more people may choose to live further away if they only have to come to an office a few days per week.
That means they will have to do more with less, and better use of technology and experimentation with ideas is not
only a good approach overall, but an imperative to keep cities liveable and functioning during these developments.
Yet, none of those previous pandemic outbreaks has “killed off” the city. On the contrary, urbanization has thrived.
People have an innate desire to socialise and cluster together to realise their creativity and productivity, for which
the modern city presents the best platform. While the pandemics certainly provide food for reflections and practical
action towards how cities should be future-proofed, it doesn’t necessarily change the direction of sustainable cities.
On the contrary, it has only stressed their importance as one of the “nexuses” or cross-sectoral areas for policy action.
Good quality, healthy housing remains at the centre of urban liveability and sustainability. The pandemic has brought
a new perspective to the housing question by demonstrating how fundamental housing is to public health. People
living in inferior and crowded housing have been hit particularly hard. Moreover, access to green public spaces
(parks, forests) as well as blue spaces (water bodies) has proven to be important for physical exercise but also mental
rehabilitation during the pandemic.
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
Furthermore, after the pandemic, creating the resilient and adaptive city – as important dimensions of the sustainable
city more broadly – is firmly back on the policy agenda. Resilience here means not simply being able to cope with the
dangerous situation, but also learning from what has happened and using this as an opportunity to make positive
and transformative changes (in line with the United Nations-advocated “building back better” principle – see section
3.8), rather than to return to the status quo (OECD, 2020). Indeed, resilience should be seen as “a metaphor for change,
not against change” (DeVerteuil and Golubchikov, 2016).
The outbreak of COVID-19 has also demonstrated that cities “need to develop efficient and innovative methods of
confronting emerging infectious disease without relying on drastic top-down state measures that can be globally
disruptive and often ineffective” (Connolly, Keil and Ali, 2020). Cities can learn from each other how to best prepare
and respond to such disasters, including finding new approaches to urban practices, urban and housing design, and
the design and organization of collective infrastructure and public spaces (see box 15). Economically, cities must
“assess the industries and clusters that are most vulnerable in their territory, evaluate the impacts future pandemics
will have for their labour markets and communities, and plan to make their economies more resilient and robust.”
(Florida and Pedigo, 2020: para 8) (see box 16).
WORK
OUT
HOME
MOVE
AROUND
GROCERY
SHOPPING
SEE A
DOCTOR
GET SOME
FRESH AIR
CULTURAL AND
ASSOCIATIVE ACTIVITY
“Platform urbanism” and smart cities are some of the trends associated with cities. They acknowledge cities as suitable
agglomerative space for the deployment of smart technologies, including in their experimental “testbed” modes.
Various “platforms” introduce new services and markets into urban life that allow things to be done more efficiently
and cost-effectively, offering new opportunities for service providers and more convenient and cost-effective services.
The pioneering online “marketplace” giants such as Amazon or eBay were followed by the emergence of the whole
new world of the so-called “sharing” or platform economy.
The sharing economy involves consumer-to-consumer based activities providing or sharing access to goods and
services between buyers and sellers, usually with the support of online platforms. The model allows new markets to
be created where users can make money from underused or idle assets, such as cars or properties. Airbnb, Uber and
their regional alternatives like Yandex Taxi and other Yandex services and similar platforms have rapidly become part
of everyday life. Carpooling services like Oszkár in Central Europe, car sharing platform and bike sharing platform have
proliferated. Similarly, co-working and freelancing platforms help match demand and supply better in a more flexible
job market. Platforms get better as they get bigger due to the network effect and the economy of the scale.
The sharing economy unlocks a tremendous potential for improved resource efficiency, while opening new markets
and boosting economic gains, especially in the high-density urban context. For example, data suggests that private
vehicles go unused for 95 per cent of their lifetime (Yaraghi and Ravi, 2017). Car sharing increases vehicle use without
increasing a number of cars on the streets. A more efficient organization of taxi rides via online services reduces the
amount of traffic. Both tourists and homeowners benefit from the lodging sharing services like Airbnb as homeowners
make use of their spare bedrooms.
However, the sharing economy has its dark sides. This includes, for example, when considerable parts of urban areas
become magnets for Airbnb-based commercial operators leading to housing markets “switch” where traditional
housing markets are converted into short-stay lets (Henley, 2019). This brings with it housing shortages, higher housing
prices and even displacement of the local population. Serious concerns have been raised about the regulatory deficit,
as online platforms can avoid more stringent regulations that normally characterise business sectors, getting away
with unfair advantages but also leading to various potential forms of abuse. For these reasons, top tourist destination
cities such as Amsterdam, Berlin, Barcelona, Paris, New York or Los Angeles have introduced permission-based and
restrictive regimes on short-term rentals.
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
These downsides, however, should not constitute a reason to cloud the enormous potential of the platform economy
overall. Cities are well advised to enable experimentation rather than constrain it, while monitoring trade-offs carefully
and intervening and regulating where the harm may exceed the benefits created (see box 17).
Cities are otherwise getting “smarter” as they explore and scale up ideas for using technology better when they plan,
design, run, and monitor urban systems and platforms. For example, electronic and contactless smart cards and other
digital solutions give rise to the concept of “mobility as a service” (MaaS). This is a user-centric platform that integrates
different mobility services and provides trip planning and one-stop fare purchase through a single platform (see box
18). As people are relying more on technology for routine communications in their daily lives, cities are also adopting
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PEOPLE-SMART SUSTAINABLE CITIES
new technology through sensors deployed to monitor and gather information about people and their environment
for reasons of ease-of-use and resource efficiency, entailing doing things better for less or more for less. Increasing
automation and efficiency have led to big data collection that is used for reporting and informing urban government
and loops back to inform planning and design.
A new form of sustainable urbanism puts innovation and technology front and centre. The initial driver was to work
towards service and resource use efficiency at a smaller scale (e.g. energy or water efficiency in buildings), but the
concept of the smart city has grown from this original ambition to one that applies to entire cities and urban areas,
no longer just transportation system or buildings. Modern applications involve increasingly levels of connectivity or
integration, with the involvement of multiple stakeholders and city components (Thornbush and Golubchikov, 2020).
High-speed internet and ubiquitous connectivity, including with the assistance of 5G mobile networks, can become
the backbone infrastructure for a digitally smart city.
City operating systems are deployed alongside “digital twins” to create more integrated ways to manage public
infrastructure and maximise its efficiency, reliability and returns. Digital twins are:
A digital representation of its entire infrastructure on a secure, enterprise-wide software platform. A state-of-the-
art digital twin is essentially an integrated, centralised platform (or “nerve centre”), where diverse information about
assets and associated services is combined, monitored, analysed and acted upon. It can be a critical facilitator of
transformation – delivering benefits across all phases of the lifecycle of designing, running and maintaining/improving
local infrastructure, whether within a single organisation or across an entire city (Tabbitt, 2020) (see box 19).
Big data and the rapidly falling cost of computing and connectivity have enabled the explosion of artificial intelligence
(AI). This is technology that is able to learn from experience how to complete increasingly complex tasks and assist
in various aspect of life. AI applications are now common in healthcare (diagnosing disease, assisted living for an
ageing population, see section 3.4), transportation (traffic control, advanced driver assistance systems), public safety
and surveillance (facial recognition), manufacturing (process control) and online retail (Vander Ark, 2018). Cities have
become testbeds for automation and experimenting with robots in managing urban services and public spaces.
Automated traffic control systems and automated supermarket tills (“self-checkout”) are already common, while
the introduction of autonomous vehicles – self-driving cars and autonomous delivery drones - is impending. These
“robotics and autonomous systems” (RAS), as they are known in engineering, extend considerably the initial smart
city applications. While “smart” technologies embody a computational logic whereby computers are programmed
to perform tasks, the RAS technologies employ AI and machine learning to make decisions and adapt processes to
circumstances without direct human agency (Macrorie, Marvin and While, 2019) (see figure 5).
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These transformations raise new critical questions. These include whether “smart cities” could become too technocratic
in actual operation, and also, with regard to citizen involvement, their effective access to information and meaningful
participation in decision-making on matters impacting their life in such a technologically automated environment.
Increasingly cities also address the challenge of a “digital divide”, based on differences in access to broadband and
devices (e.g. due to socio-economic factors) and the lack of capacity or confidence to use for some group (e.g. due to
age or disability). People-smart cities need to be digitally inclusive, to enhance capabilities, ensure access and benefits
to all citizens. A digital inclusion strategy needs to be part of the digital transition at city-level to “leave no-one behind”.
One further important dimension is a search for new ethical principles for ICT-based “smart city”. Problems that
are associated with cybersecurity and big data, including personal privacy and ultimately democracy need to be
addressed (Thornbush and Golubchikov, 2020). But smart and digital systems penetrate increasingly deeper into
the intimate spheres of personal life, which allows technology giants to aggregate, analyse, and trade personal data,
so that right of an individual to privacy becomes increasingly elusive (Zuboff, 2019). Regulatory frameworks such as
the EU General Data Protection Regulations are important in this context to govern the processing of personal data,
including in digital circulations. Similar ethical concerns exist for robotics and autonomous systems (RAS). Beyond
privacy issues, these concerns, according to UKRAS (Winfield et al., 2019), include, for example: bias (e.g. potential
bias against minority or low-income groups as well as needs of women), employment (e.g. displacement of certain
classes of workers), safety (e.g. production of new risks due to the deployment of RAS such as autonomous vehicles
or weapons), and oversight (e.g. the ability of operators to manage the behaviour of systems). There are calls to
introduce “responsible urban robotics” (Nagenbord, 2018), while the ethical artificial intelligence movement demands
technology companies develop and commercialize AI that prevents harm and advances humanity, increases societal
and environmental wellbeing and respects human rights. This includes, but is not limited to, voluntary ethical codes,
ethics-by-design principles in software development, new governance structures and employee training programmes
(Telenor Group, 2020).
Here, too, flexibility is important. Overly restrictive or misguided regulatory approaches can hinder important
innovation and radically reduce the potential benefit of, for instance, data aggregation. Several technical solutions,
such as distributed ledgers, can help enable more liberal use and trade of valuable data while ensuring reasonable
privacy and anonymity, and government has an important part to play to align standards and set clear, transparent,
and flexible rules of the game.
Housing is placed right at the centre of urban life. As will be further discussed in Section 4.5, various supply-side
constraints, such as zoning restrictions or opposition of residents, prevent the expansion of housing supply, and, as a
result, concentrating that supply on high-income housing. Finding solutions for the provision of affordable housing
remains a key responsibility for city governments. However, sustainability also calls for going beyond the “building
buildings” way of thinking. People-smart cities aspire to widen access to adequate and affordable housing that supports
more than basic needs, but allows full participation of people in urban life, connects to lifestyle preferences, everyday
infrastructure and public spaces. If housing, even if fairly “green” and affordable, is not located in the right place, is not
integrated with the social infrastructure and public transport network, and is not socially- and age- inclusive as well as
aesthetically attractive, it is hardly contributing to the multidimensional vision of urban sustainability. The Geneva UN
Charter on Sustainable Housing (United Nations, 2017) insists on “access to decent, adequate, affordable and healthy
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housing for all” by promoting its four principles: environmental protection; economic effectiveness; social inclusion
and participation; and cultural adequacy. These varied considerations for sustainable affordable housing should be
dealt with at multiple levels and require a close dialogue between multiple governmental functions (see table 2).
• Planning and building regulations • Appropriate location, density • Ensuring resource efficiency
• Climate and energy policies • Ecosystem protection • Green design, greening
Environmental
infrastructure
• Affordable decent homes • Integrating housing in urban areas
• Sense of community
• Social housing frameworks • Slum upgrade
• Accessible/inclusive buildings
• Education and information • Urban creativity, diversity • Aesthetics of the built environment
Cultural
Part of this vision is the integration of housing into urban life more generally, a search for more appealing urban
environments with positive “vibes” and vibrancy – not only for the younger population, but for all ages. There are
many dimensions here, but one of the key ones is a high quality of urban “social infrastructure”. This can be broadly
defined as “the construction and maintenance of facilities that support social services. Types of social infrastructure
include healthcare (hospitals), education (schools and universities), public facilities (community housing and prisons)
and transportation (railways and roads). All of these structures serve as the backbone for communities and societies.”
(Cohen, 2017) (see table 3).
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Public Places or facilities that are provided publicly and Libraries, museums, art galleries, universities,
institutions intended for public use. schools, memorials, squares, plazas, parks.
Commerce Spaces that involve commercial transactions. Markets, shops, laundrettes, cafes, bars, barbers, hair
Payment might be required for entrance or to buy salons, nail bars, restaurants, hardware stores, street
goods or services in the space. vendors.
Recreational Places or facilities that are designed to facilitate a Gyms, sports fields, basketball courts, swimming
activities recreation or leisure activity. pools, allotments, cinemas, theatres, bowling alleys,
skate parks.
Religion Spaces designed for religion. Places of worship. Churches, church halls, mosques, synagogues,
gurdwaras, temples, stupas.
Transit The spaces and infrastructures of mobility. Buses, bus stops, bike lanes, trams, subways,
sidewalks, train stations, walking trails.
Source: Adapted from Latham and Layton (2019: p.6).
Apart from providing key services for the proper functioning of cities as cities, urban social infrastructure, including
public and green spaces, glues urban civic life together and caters to the needs of different urban social groups. As
such, if used strategically, it can help fight key pressing challenges for cities such as inequalities, social disintegration
and promoting physical and mental health (Klinenberg, 2018).
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By clustering collective social infrastructure cities provide not only for the needs of their own citizens, but they
share their benefits with broader areas.; for example, by concentrating higher education, hospitals, or government
functions. The “centrality” of a city within national and international socio-economic flows is not simply defined by the
size of the city in the urban hierarchy, but by the existence of superior and unique social infrastructure functions of
national and international significance. This includes cities being seats of central, provincial or international branches
of governments or hosting universities. Developing such functions of centrality, whether in a bottom-up (by cities) or
top-down (by central government) manner, is important, for example, for redressing geographical disparities.
People-smart cities also pursue an integrated approach to sustainable mobility. Cities like Moscow have made
substantial progress in making urban life more comfortable by boosting the quality of social infrastructure alongside
the rapid expansion of public rail transit, as well as pedestrian and cycling lanes (see box 20).
Non-conventional forms of public transit can help connect peripheral places to urban cores more efficiently, with
less pollution. Electricity-powered cable cars, for example, modify their tourist connotation when they are designed
to provide better connectivity for disadvantaged communities, as they do in the Latin American cities of Medellin,
La Paz or Rio de Janeiro. The 3.7 km Volga Aerial Tramway of Nizhny Novgorod was built in 2012 as the first regular
public transit cable car route of Russia. In just over 10 minutes it connects the centre of the regional capital with the
less well-off city of Bor on the other bank of the Volga River, otherwise only accessible by an often congested 20 km
drive via a motorway.
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Re-adjusting urban roads and streets for public transport can make difference without heavy infrastructural investment.
Almaty in Kazakhstan has developed bus rapid transit (BRT) in 2013 as a strategy of sustainable transport. This includes
the development of high-speed corridors for buses and trolleybuses as well as infrastructure for non-motorised traffic.
A green corridor combines the unconditional priority of public transport with bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure in
one of the busiest streets in Almaty (UNECE, 2020b).
Urban housing, social infrastructure and mobility patterns also need to accommodate the needs of the older persons,
particularly in the context of ageing populations. People-smart cities provide the necessary conditions for older people
to have the ability and a pleasant environment in which to age in place (see section 2.5). Providing this necessitates
considerations in urban design such as assisted living, adaptive houses, houses and buildings accessible for wheelchair
users, ramps and escalators, rest areas, public toilets, street safety and accessibility, barrier-free transportation and
sidewalks, and generally more innovative healthcare and technology.
The city of Ottawa in Canada promotes age-friendly adjustments of municipal infrastructure through its Older Adult
Plan established in 2012 (City of Ottawa, 2020). The city also provides older adults with a comprehensive accessible
guide to the city services and programmes available to them (City of Ottawa, 2016).
Rapidly expanding smart city technologies offer innovative ICT-based products, services and systems for disability
and ageing, such as IT sensors, alarms and telecare, all of which can reduce emergencies and promote social inclusion.
Coupled with other measures, age-friendly smart technologies and design can not only provide older people with
independence and a more comfortable environment to live in but can also reduce demand for health and social services.
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The Italian municipality of Bolzano gives an example of ICT-assisted living for the older persons:
The Italian municipality of Bolzano has teamed up with the private sector to install a range of sensors to help older
residents stay in their homes longer. These include touch pads on which they can place their medications to be
reminded to take their tablets, or if they have already taken them. Water and electricity sensors track the routine
of washing up, showering, watching TV, or putting the kettle on. There are door sensors to monitor if residents are
getting up and out and about. And bed pads show whether a resident is sleeping, or if they’ve had a fall out of bed
(UNECE, 2020d: p. 8).
But even simple things such as installing an easy to use video calling platform in the homes of older citizens could
radically increase the quality and efficiency of care and quality of life overall, especially in situations where older
people must protect themselves from epidemics such as COVID-19. Certainly, the dignity of private life, individual
choice, privacy and security remain imperative considerations in deploying ICT-based solutions.1
1 For case studies on age-friendly cities and communities, see also WHO (2020).
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Accessibility is also an important consideration more broadly for inclusive cities. The city of Lyon in France is praised
for its integrated and participatory approach to sustainable mobility planning, putting users and their needs at the
heart of the planning process. The city has identified accessibility as a cross-cutting issue for city liveability and invests
substantially in creating a barrier-free and inclusive environment. It has been estimated that as much as a third of the
public transport users of the city are affected by mobility issues; this includes people with “permanently reduced”
mobility as well as “temporarily reduced” mobility (e.g. pregnant women, people with pushchairs, shopping bags
or luggage). All of the vehicles used for public transport are equipped with a low floor, retractable ramps and wider
entrance doors. Metro stations have various technologies to enable easy access for people with reduced mobility.
A remote-control device can be used by visually impaired people to receive travel information at bus stops and
at passenger information kiosks and can also be used to activate sound boxes at pedestrian crossings. Training
programmes for public transport drivers make sure that the needs of people with reduced mobility are fully addressed.
Its accessibility programme targets also public space and municipal institutions, and overall accessibility of life in the
city (e.g. culture, education, employment and information) (Modijefsky, 2019).
Overcoming gender inequality is yet another consideration for people-smart sustainable cities, particularly as cities
become more technologically sophisticated. Women tend to use ICT and related infrastructures and services less
than men; moreover, an unbalanced division of work and family care may prevent women from fully benefitting from
the value generated by smart cities (Nesti, 2019). Poorer women and single mothers are also more reliant on social
housing than men, often due to be the primary carer for children (URBACT, 2019). Moreover, the uses of, and needs
from, urban infrastructure for men and women are also different.
Austria is one of a few countries worldwide, which has implemented “gender budgeting” into their constitution,
meaning that budgets, revenue and expenditures must encourage equality between women and men (United
Nations, 2020). In Vienna gender mainstreaming has been a cross-cutting principle for city development since 2005.
Vienna has a long tradition of incorporating the specific needs of women in planning urban infrastructure to make it
more inclusive for women; for example, adding streetlights to increase safety at night, widening sidewalks for strollers
or wheelchairs and designing social housing with flexibility for different family situation. More recently, the Smart
City Wien Framework – exemplary in many respects for a people-smart sustainable city strategy – has recognised
gender equality, safety and security as key ingredients in improving quality of life of the city. The Framework defines
gender mainstreaming as: “a concept to denote a gender-equitable society with equal social structures, starting
points and framework conditions… women and men are thus not viewed as a uniform, homogeneous group; rather,
their respective social, ethnic or age-related differences are taken account of” (City of Vienna, 2014: p. 104). The city
has also produced practical guides for mainstreaming gender in urban planning and urban development (City of
Vienna, 2013).
More broadly, the human capital of women often remains underused, especially as they today tend to have higher levels
of educational achievement. Addressing the digital divide between men and women and encouraging employers to
offer more flexibility in working arrangements – for example, using teleworking and the benefits of the platform
economy – can provide increased opportunities for women to participate in the economy and entrepreneurship, a
move which would also help society to enhance capabilities of women.
The role of cities here includes not only pioneering and leading new initiatives, but also meeting the increasingly more
demanding regulatory requirements coming from the national and international level for reducing GHG emissions, as
well as building local adaptive measures.
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Mitigation efforts mostly focus on energy, as its contribution to the GHG emissions is estimated to be three-fourths
of the total. This is mostly a result of the combustion of fossil fuels (coal, oil, gas), which are the main source of CO2.
The so-called decarbonisation of economies — i.e. reducing CO2 emissions via limiting energy consumption and
switching to non-carbon-based fuels (such as renewables) — has become a major direction of policy in the emerged
consensus about the urgency of climate change. SDG 7 demands for the expansion of renewable energy as part of
its call to “ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”, which goes alongside SDG 13
“take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts”.
This is not something beyond own ambitions and capacities of cities; cities have long taken the challenge seriously.
Vancouver as far back as in 1990 produced its Clouds of Change Report (City of Vancouver, 1990) on the municipal
role in addressing climatic and atmospheric changes, which, among many other measures, included specific
recommendations for CO2 reduction in the city. Portland was the first United States (US) city to adopt a climate action
plan in 1993. Following such pioneering examples, thousands of cities have incorporated climate and energy targets
in their development strategies and plans (REN21, 2019). In many cases, these targets are even more ambitious than
targets set by their national governments.
The mitigation ambitions range from Copenhagen - which according to its climate plan aims to be “the world’s first
carbon-neutral capital city” as early as by 2025 (City of Copenhagen, 2012) - to the Fossil Fuel Free 2030 - Climate
Positive 2050 plan of Uppsala (Uppsala Kommun, 2020) to Barcelona, Paris and Berlin, whose targets to become
climate-neutral by 2050 are just timed with the EU corresponding goal. Some other larger cities in the UNECE region
that have already pledged to become carbon neutral include: Boulder, San Francisco, Glasgow and Oslo (by 2030),
Helsinki (by 2035), Stockholm (by 2040), Amsterdam, Hamburg, London, Toronto, Vancouver, Minneapolis, New York
City, Portland, Seattle and Washington DC (by 2050) (Carbon Neutral Cities Alliance, 2019). REN21 (2019) also lists
the following cities that have introduced city-wide net-zero/carbon-neutrality targets by 2050 or earlier: Montreal,
Heidelberg, Bristol, Manchester, Nottingham, Austin, Boston, Los Angeles.2
As part of these plans or as standalone ambitions, many cities also engage with 100 per cent renewable energy targets,
either for municipal operations or citywide (ICLEI, 2020). In most cases, these targets are restricted to electricity use,
but occasionally cover heating and cooling, transport and other end-use sectors. In Germany alone, more than 150
districts and cities have adopted 100 per cent renewable electricity targets, including Hamburg and Munich by 2025 and
Frankfurt by 2050. Hassfurt achieved 100 per cent renewable electricity in 2017 and aims to scale up renewables in other
sectors, including by expanding its district heating capacity. In the US, several cities already have transitioned to 100 per
cent renewable power, including Aspen (Colorado), Burlington (Vermont) and Greensburg (Kansas) (REN 21, 2019: p.53).
These plans create a sense of direction for these municipalities and regions; although contrary to national commitments,
these targets are more aspirational and not legally binding and may be thus contingent on local electoral cycles. New
ambitious initiatives will likely to raise the number of such cities even further in the coming years. As part of the
European Green Deal Strategy to make Europe climate neutral by 2050, the Mission Board for Climate-neutral and
Smart Cities of the European Commission promotes the idea of reaching 100 climate-neutral cities by 2030, which
would be used as experimentation and innovation hubs for all cities (European Commission, 2020b).
Cities address climate neutrality in a wide range of areas, including, for example:
(a) Changing energy infrastructure and energy supply structure: for example, decarbonizing heating systems via
expanding district heating and CHP, deploying solar and other renewable energy systems and using waste-to-
energy facilities (see also section 3.7);
(b) Using procurement for clean energy and energy-efficient municipal services such as street lighting;
(c) Increasing energy efficiency standards of new and existing buildings, including housing and public buildings;
(d) Optimizing urban development and planning: for example, transit-oriented and mixed-use developments,
walkable urban districts;
2 Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit provides a map of cities with net zero targets and links them to sources.
See: https://eciu.net/netzerotracker/map
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(e) Transport sector measures: for example, modal shifts, eco-mobility, reduction in vehicle fuel consumption and
emissions, and developing car sharing and pooling;
(f ) Working with industries to minimize their carbon footprint;
(g) Encouraging climate friendly consumption and lifestyles, including through policies that encourage personal
choices of citizens to achieve net-zero.
Reducing energy demand and using energy efficiency are always more cost-effective, no-regret solutions and are
prioritised in the hierarchy of mitigation measures. Decreasing end-use energy demands through energy saving,
efficiency measures and lifestyle change alleviates the need to generate as much energy and, thus, moderates the
carbon footprint.
Buildings and houses are some of the main sectors in this regard as they consume a bulk of total energy. There are
trends almost everywhere towards strengthening energy standards for new-built buildings, such as the mandatory
“nearly zero-energy buildings” standards promoted in the EU (European Parliament and Council of the European
Union, 2010). However, it is also important to provide energy retrofit/regeneration for existing low-efficiency
buildings, since they will still constitute the majority of the built environment for many decades. A good economy
of scale can be achieved when regenerating the apartment housing stock. Moscow engages in a comprehensive
programme of housing stock replacement, while Freiburg and Berlin have achieved deep energy retrofits as part of
their rehabilitation programmes (see box 21).
Box 21: Addressing climate neutrality in buildings through the international centres of excellence
Cross-department work of UNECE on sustainable energy helps reduce GHG emissions and the carbon footprint of cities.
As part of this work, UNECE has launched a global network of International Centres of Excellence on High-Performance
Buildings (ICE-HPB). Their mission is to advance the rapid transition to high-performance buildings, locally and around
the world, in support of the SDGs and the Paris Climate Accord, while fostering a thriving building industry that creates
healthy, comfortable, and sustainable buildings everywhere for everyone. The network works to disseminate and deploy
the UNECE Framework Guidelines for Energy Efficiency Standards in Buildings.
One of the centres, the Greater Pittsburgh ICE-HPB is an extension of the Green Building Alliance (GBA) of Pittsburgh
and its existing programming, technical assistance, trainings, and outreach activities. The centre has the intention to
scale these efforts to realize greater impact. GBA works with stakeholders including building owners and operators, K-12
educators and facility managers, academics and researchers, architects, engineers, contractors, community members,
and government officials to create healthy and vibrant places. GBA fosters networks of professionals to advance
sustainability in its region, including the International Living Future Collaborative, the Emerging Professionals, and the
Women+ in Green network. GBA convenes the Pittsburgh 2030 District, the largest in the world with over 700 buildings
committed to reducing their energy use, water use, and transportation emissions by 50 per cent by the year 2030, while
improving indoor air quality.
Sources: UNECE (2019a).
But even with efficiency measures, demands for energy will always be present, with a growing population and
economic development bringing further pressures. It is necessary to decouple economies from carbon emissions by
decreasing the share of fossil fuels and increasing the role of renewables. Cities are transferring their energy supply
to clean energy, drawing on “distributed” sources and modes of energy: another measure that can be introduced
in modernising energy infrastructure to produce and manage more sustainable energy. Within distributed energy
systems, buildings can serve as “power plants” and generate more electricity than they consume. This can then in
turn, for example, fuel electric cars or supply the grid. Individual households, housing associations and businesses,
by producing and consuming their own energy, are effectively turned into “prosumers”: a model that gives citizens
options to take part in energy transitions as active participants.
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Cities can do much with a focus on transport, which remains predominantly fuelled by fossil fuels in most places.
Municipal procurement for clean energy and green technologies used by public services and transport is an effective
direct lever that city administrations have, alongside with city planning and incentivizing modal shifts from private
cars to public transports, walking and cycling (e.g. with congestion charges, separating traffic). As further discussed in
Section 3.6, in order to combat air pollution and climate change many cities are introducing low emission zones and
plan to phase out combustion engine-powered vehicles.
While climate neutrality is a strategy to be “climate-smart”, it is also a means to address other environmental,
economic and social challenges. Certainly, policies such as compact city, transport planning, increased green
spaces and improved energy efficiency are all elements of urban sustainability that predate the international quest
for climate neutrality. Climate neutrality is, furthermore, an opportunity to promote national and local economic
competitiveness, to enhance energy security, to improve quality of life and to tackle energy poverty (i.e. a condition
where people cannot afford energy services sufficient to cover their basic human needs, leading to deprivation). The
pursuit of these co-benefits is crucial for gaining support of stakeholders to climate-neutral policies (Thornbush and
Golubchikov, 2020).
However, this is not to suggest that urban energy transitions are automatically inclusive and socially benevolent.
Evidence is abundant that without redistributive policies and also without engagement with procedural/participatory
justice, low carbon transitions have uneven impacts on different communities and places, with economically
vulnerable social groups and deprived areas being left behind the benefits of transition, while still bearing a burden
as renewable energy subsidies are translated into higher energy bills for everyone (Golubchikov and O’Sullivan, 2020).
Furthermore, in the absence of compensatory mechanisms, cities that due to their specialisation are relying on high-
carbon economies (e.g. heavy industry or coal-mining regions) are likely to be hit hard socially and economically in
case of rapid decarbonisation requirements.
In view of this, for example, the European Commission has launched the Just Transition Mechanism (JTM) as part of its
Green Deal (European Commission, 2020a). The JTM seeks to overcome the economic and social costs of the climate
transition in the most vulnerable coal and carbon-intensive regions. This mechanism creates investment to help
workers and communities which rely on the fossil fuel value chain. It is a tool to ensure that the transition towards a
climate-neutral economy happens in a fair way, leaving no one behind.
Partly for the same reason of ensuring “energy justice” and partly to retain better control over the development and
pricing policies, many cities insist on retaining municipal ownership of key municipal utilities and infrastructure,
including those which are energy related. Barcelona, Munich and Nottingham retain a full municipal ownership
over utilities. Some cities have even engaged in re-municipalisation of energy networks. Notable examples include
German cities such as Berlin and Hamburg.
In any case, policies need to be people-smart in addition to be technologically-savvy, prioritizing, for example, low-
income groups or social housing (Golubchikov and Deda, 2012). Since technology does not provide with a universal
solution, it is necessary to include linked scientific and social research that does not exclude the role of the individual,
culture, and society. This is especially relevant since social participation and consumption are also driving forces of
social change, which could affect the acceptance and adoption of new technology. Climate-neutral cities presuppose
a change from fragmented sectoral-based interventions to an interrelated matrix of comprehensive actions integrated
at an urban scale.
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Environmental determinants of health (factors which directly or indirectly impact the physical, mental or social
wellbeing of a population) often share causes with other environmental nuisances. For example, sources of emissions
of GHGs (e.g. cars) are often also responsible for air and noise pollution, which are among the main detrimental
environmental determinants of health in cities. Policies supporting public health can have a beneficial impact on
environmental challenges, and vice versa.
Negative environmental impacts are often socially differentiated. Poor residents in many countries tend to be more
exposed to environmental hazards due to discriminatory siting of polluters, segmentation of housing prices or the
need to sacrifice health for the sake of employment. Similarly, economically vulnerable groups struggle with affording
access to essential environmental services, such as clean and safe water, energy or good quality food.
Cities, as key consumers of ecological resources, play a crucial role in ensuring ecological stewardship and
environmental justice. Green and nature-based solutions are already commonly used in many cities, which among
other things help cities to address the challenges of climate change. Cities are also hubs for experimenting with
environmentally sustainable ideas. This is, of course, part of the overall dynamics of cities bringing people, ideas, talent,
demand, and public sector responsiveness together. Urban dwellers, however, also have a higher incentive to combat
the problems they tangibly suffer from, such as pollution. Demand in urban areas tends to be more sophisticated and
environmentally aware. Urban residents are more likely to download apps to avoid food waste or to think about their
carbon footprint. This allows cities to experiment to find out what works, and then to scale up good ideas to rural
areas and other cities and beyond.
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The connections between water quality, sanitation and health are also concerns for cities. Ensuring equitable access to
water and sanitation is important in order to respond to and prepare for water-related epidemics outbreaks, as well as for
pandemics such as COVID-19. The provision of safe and sufficient water and adequate sanitation for all and in all settings
is the key to promote appropriate hygiene practices and, in the absence of a vaccine or effective treatment, frequent
handwashing with soap is a simple but effective intervention to limit the spread of COVID-19. Nevertheless, this may be
challenging where vulnerable and/or marginalized groups face obstacles in accessing water and sanitation services or
where certain sections of the population face affordability concerns. Equity gaps thus need to be appropriately mapped
out and addressed to strengthen inclusive and informed responses to pandemics as well as future preparedness, while
always ensuring that the most vulnerable do not suffer disproportionately in times of emergencies. The UNECE–WHO
Regional Office for Europe Protocol on Water and Health to the Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary
Watercourses and International Lakes helps to address these issues systematically and to identify vulnerability and
problems with equitable access to water and sanitation, including at the urban level (see box 22).
Box 22: The equitable access principles of the Protocol on Water and Health
The UNECE Protocol on Water and Health is a legally binding instrument aimed at achieving an adequate supply of safe
drinking water and sanitation for everyone and effectively protecting human health and water resources. Parties are
required to establish national and/or local targets for the quality of drinking water and the quality of discharges, as
well as for the performance of water supply and waste-water treatment. The Protocol stipulates that “equitable access
to water, adequate in terms both of quantity and of quality, should be provided for all members of the population,
especially those who suffer a disadvantage or social exclusion”. This embodies the “no-one left behind” approach, which
is an integral part of the 2030 Agenda, particularly SDG 6: “Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and
sanitation for all”.
The concept of “equitable access” under the Protocol is defined in terms of: (1) tackling geographical disparities, (2)
addressing the needs of vulnerable and marginalized groups and (3) ensuring the affordability of services. By working
along these dimensions to improve equitable access, countries progressively realize the human rights to safe drinking
and sanitation (UNECE and WHO Europe, 2019: p. 41).
One of the tools developed under the Protocol is the “Equitable Access Score-card: supporting policy processes to achieve
the human right to water and sanitation” (UNECE and WHO Europe, 2013). This is a self-assessment tool that allows
governments to establish a baseline measure of the situation with respect to equitable access to water and sanitation.
For example, a self-assessment exercise was carried out in France in 2012-2013. It identified a number of areas for
improvement, including with respect to large locational disparities in terms of prices and 140,000 homeless people who
did not have access to drinking water; affordability concerns were identified as one of the main issues in the Greater Paris
area. The equitable access perspective informed national measures on access to water and sanitation. Most notably,
action was taken on the experimentation of social pricing by municipalities (e.g. social tariffs and other financing
mechanisms), with a view to addressing affordability concerns and promoting a simple and efficient system.
Sources: UNECE and WHO Europe (2000); UNECE and WHO Europe (2019)
Emissions from vehicles remain a key source of air pollution in cities. Many cities are taking action to phase out
combustion-engine powered vehicles in order to improve local air quality and reduce carbon footprint. This follows
national targets as more countries in Europe plan to get rid of combustion-engine passenger cars. Norway is set to be
the first to ban the sale of passenger cars and light vans, which are not zero-emissions, from 2025 onward while other
countries have the period of 2030-2040 in their plans. Almost 30 cities have made their local plans or have pledged to
prohibit combustion-engine cars from driving in city centres or entire cities. In contrast to national governments, city
targets normally cover all cars and include both new and second-hand vehicles. However, rather than sales restrictions,
city measures mostly concern prohibiting combustion-engine vehicles from entering or driving in certain city areas.
Many localities are focusing on full bans for diesel vehicles first and then gasoline-powered cars. The International
Council on Clean Transportation (Wappelhorst, 2020) has reported the following larger cities taking action: Rome, Paris,
Oslo, Bergen, London, Strasbourg, Milan, Amsterdam, and Brussels. Local deadlines range from 2024 to 2035.
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Congestion changes have long been introduced in many cities to reduce general traffic in certain urban zones. Some
cities now operate or intend to introduce partial driving bans in designated low emission zones (LEZs) for combustion-
engine vehicles. However, these restrictions are limited to certain fuel types or vehicles of certain European emissions
standards. Combustion-engine vehicles are often still allowed to enter regulated city areas on a fee basis or if they
belong to local residents. By 2020, LEZs were introduced in Madrid (Madrid Central zone), Krakow (Clean Transport
Zone), London (Ultra-Low Emission Zone), as well as Stuttgart, Berlin, Stockholm, Bucharest (Wappelhorst, 2020).
UNECE offers a variety of platforms to address environmental issues in cities in a cross-sectoral manner, including with
respect to vehicles. The UNECE Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP) is an important
framework mechanism to mitigate the negative impacts of transport on health and environmental pollution (see box 11).
Furthermore, the World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulation (WP.29) develops standardized regulatory systems
to reduce environmental impacts from vehicles, as well as to improve road vehicle safety and security (see box 23).
Smart technologies help better monitor the urban environment. Extensive networks of air pollution monitoring
systems have allowed the development of smartphone applications which permit users to follow real-time
information on air quality indicators such as the European Air Quality Index, as well as PM10, PM2.5, CO, NO2 and SO2
concentrations. In Gothenburg, Sweden, data on air quality is made available for easy use by pupils on the way to
school via a smartphone app. Such data also provides a better basis for policy decisions by decision-makers and for
people to change their behaviour; all this contributes to improved health (Hallgren, 2017). Another example is the
“AirCare” application, which was initially developed for the city of Skopje. This now covers cities in the entire Balkans
region. Making air quality data easily accessible not only allows people to minimize their exposure to pollutions, but
also stimulates the political will to better address environmental health challenges.
In many places, NGOs play a major role with very limited resources, taking bottom-up initiatives to monitor and inform
of challenges related to urban pollution and inequities, which in turn contribute to tackling these challenges. For
example, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, in winter, suffers from smog caused by high volumes of traffic, as well as emissions from
buildings heated by coal and synthetic materials such as old car tires, plastic, and used oils. A local youth ecological
movement “Move Green” has improved public information on air pollution through the installation of air monitoring
devices in the city and offering an app for mobile devices for real-time monitoring, enhancing the participation of
young people in efforts to reduce air pollution in Bishkek (Move Green Association, 2018).
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There are many experiments with smart technology, and this is only the beginning of exploring the potential.
One example of smart integration of air pollution monitoring into health and mobility is the mass deployment
of interconnected air monitoring sensors. These can be linked with an air pollution-aware toll system with highly
dynamic real-time pricing that can coordinate congestion charges based on levels of air pollution in urban areas,
incentivising drivers to take less polluted routes thus improving public health (Rodriguez and Küpper, 2019).
Food waste is a case in point. While minimizing or preventing food waste is important; food waste is often reused as
a fertiliser. Using food waste as an energy source is also growing, as is investigating the interrelationships between
waste, food, energy and water more broadly. Food waste is now frequently used for biogas generation; solutions are
needed to minimize water consumption in the process of biogas generation. Wastewater treatment plants help both
the conversion of wastewater into biogas and the production of organic fertiliser. Landfills can equally be a source of
methane gas and biogas. Reportedly, in Sweden, more than 60 per cent of municipalities collect food waste for energy
purposes, producing an estimated 5.2 petajoules (PJ) of biomethane annually that can be injected into the local gas
grid or used as a transport fuel (REN21, 2019). Innovative city-based IT apps can help to track and prevent food waste.
Food waste reduction measures work well in cities such as New York, which have all the right elements: high interest
from consumers on the issue, the proximity to shipping from one place to another, the entrepreneurs and resources.
Such solutions need to be scalable, sustainable and to go beyond wealthier cities, which the preventive food loss
measures of UNECE are aiming at (see box 24).
Traditionally, urban management for the food, water, energy, and waste sectors is operated in silos; that is, by different
departments and different sets of policies and practices. However, the realisation of the merits of interconnections
between these systems has become an aspiration for bringing them together as part of the combined and integrated
“energy-food-water-waste” nexus, particularly at the urban scale. The aim of this is:
to look holistically at activating the sectoral inter-linkages and principles of a resource-efficient city… by
establishing a closer dialogue between national and local governments to identify and remove policy barriers and
create new strong partnerships at the local level. [This] aims to enhance co-operation between different levels of
government, municipal administrations (departments) and planning offices, city administrations and across city
jurisdictions (Lehmann, 2018).
3 For discussions on the governance of natural resources more broadly, refer to the Natural Resource Nexuses in the ECE Region
(2020).
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More generally, making value out of what is seen as a “waste” so that it becomes an input resource for further processing
is what defines the circular economy approach. According to one definition, a circular economy is “where the value
of products, materials and resources is maintained in the economy for as long as possible, and the generation of
waste minimized” (European Commission, 2015). By extension, a “circular city”: “aims to create a sustainable system
that allows for the optimal use of city assets and products through re-using, refurbishing, remanufacturing, recycling
and other circular actions” (United 4 Smart Sustainable Cities, 2020). Cities can also try out different ways of taxing
externalities to encourage recycling and discourage clearly avoidable waste.
A circular economy is not limited to the material flows of solid or liquid waste, but can also include, for example,
recycling of previously industrial lands (brownfields) as new urban areas, with low ecological impacts. For instance,
in Pittsburgh (US), the new mixed-use development of the Hazelwood Green at the former brownfield site aims to
achieve net-zero energy and climate-neutral standards for the district by adopting renewable energy solutions.
Land use planning and energy-circular economy can be further integrated with the support of district heating (and
cooling) systems. For example, combined heat and power (CHP) generation is an effective way to capture thermal
energy that is otherwise wasted into the atmosphere in conventional power generation. The heat generated through
CHP can be used for space heating, cooling, domestic hot water and industrial processes. The integration of CHP into
district heating systems, which supply heating and hot water, has been a long and well-established tradition in cities
of the former Soviet Union and its successor States and some countries of Eastern, Central and Northern Europe.
Ideally, all these manifestations of circular economy – that is, with regard to land use, water, food, energy and more -
are integrated into a singular ecological nexus as part of urban management. Hammarby Sjöstad, a former industrial
area in Stockholm, generated much publicity when it was rebuilt as a compact green town, with a goal to cardinally
reduce its environmental footprint in comparison with similar districts in Stockholm. It has become known for its
“Hammarby model”, which includes a combined urban and engineering design where energy, waste and water are
part of a singular ecological process. For its district heating system, heat is harvested from purified wastewater, waste
incinerator and biofuels. The vacuum waste suction system transports household waste to the periphery of the
district, which reduces the need for waste collection traffic.
In Jerusalem, the Sorek Treatment Facility collects domestic wastewater from the Jerusalem metropolitan area. The
sludge is converted to methane gas and supplies 70 per cent of the electric energy needed for the facility to function;
the treated water is redistributed for irrigating non-farmable vegetation such as street trees and parks (Water
Technology, 2020).
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Another example of a circular urban design is Vancouver, which, even in the absence of the culture of district heating
in North America, has leveraged the opportunity provided by the 2010 Winter Olympic to regenerate the area of
Southeast False Creek Neighbourhood with the inclusion of the “first in North America low carbon district energy
system”. Its district heating system uses thermal energy captured from sewage to provide space heating and hot
water in the neighbourhood, leading to a 60 per cent reduction of GHG associated with heating buildings (City of
Vancouver, 2015).
Regretfully, such opportunities for transforming waste into resource at the time of comprehensive urban regeneration
are often lost due to a lack of strategic oversight, national pressures, cross-party coordination, experience and/or a
fear of opposition. In Cardiff, a new and modern waste incinerator opened in 2014 wasted the huge amount of heat
it generated despite being located next to a large-scale Cardiff Bay redevelopment project; a plan for a district heat
network utilizing this heat was only conceived five years later (BBC, 2018).
In Riga food waste is sent to produce renewable energy based on landfill gas, while the co-generated heat in this
process is used in nearby greenhouses, growing off-season vegetables (FAO, 2016). District heating systems are also
increasingly shifted to renewable sources. All of the district heating needs of Iceland were met by renewables (including
recycled heat). Renewables also supply the majority of district heat in Switzerland, Lithuania, Denmark and France. As
an example of the optimisation of energy flows to prevent losses, in Hamburg the local district heating network has
been connected to electric heating technologies, enabling it to use surplus electricity from nearby renewable power
projects. This can help to mitigate the volatile and unpredictable nature of renewable energy sources such as solar
and wind, which can result in wasted capacity at time of imbalances between high supply and low demand.
Many places are experimenting with waste minimization. An example is the community-led development of the self-
sustained, zero waste eco-village of Boekel in the Netherlands. A group of people plan to build their own sustainable
eco-village in Boekel that produces zero waste and is self-sustained. The government has supported their efforts and
offered space to realize this idea (De Beer, 2015).
The dissemination of knowledge concerning landfills and illegal dumping sites can also help to address the problem
of waste. The “Ecomapa” of Ukraine is an online inventory and interactive map of landfills and serves as a platform to
build coalitions. The map includes environmental information on recycling centres, landfills and waste management
as well as hazardous waste. Individuals can also report locations where waste was illegally dumped (Ministry of Energy
and Environmental Protection of Ukraine, 2020).
SDG 11 Target 11.5 calls for governments to: “by 2030, significantly reduce the number of deaths and the number
of people affected and substantially decrease the direct economic losses relative to global gross domestic product
caused by disasters, including water-related disasters, with a focus on protecting the poor and people in vulnerable
situations”.
The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 is a global agreement to reduce and prevent disaster risks
across the globe. It aims to strengthen social and economic resilience to ease the negative effects of climate change,
and disasters caused by natural or technological hazards. The framework defines disaster as “a serious disruption
of the functioning of a community or a society at any scale due to hazardous events interacting with conditions
of exposure, vulnerability and capacity, leading to one or more of the following: human, material, economic and
environmental losses and impacts” (United Nations, 2016).
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Similarly, in the context of climate, The Paris Agreement recognized the need to address loss and damage associated
with the effects of climate change. The agreement identified areas of cooperation central to DRR and called for
investments to address the underlying risk drivers associated with rising GHG emission levels and to inspire innovation
and low-carbon growth. However, much greater ambition and accelerated action is required pre-2030 to meet the
goal, outcome and targets of the Sendai Framework.
The nature of the risks cities are exposed to depends on the geographical location of the city or its internal
circumstances. Many major cities were historically built close to water bodies (sea coastline or rivers), meaning they
are likely to be exposed to water-related disasters, such as floods, storms and tsunamis. Water-related and weather-
related risks are exacerbated by climate change, leading to a rise in the intensity and frequency of storms, floods,
avalanches, heat waves and droughts. Many large cities in the UNECE region are also located in seismic active zones
and are exposed to earthquakes or even volcanic activity (like Naples, Catania, Seattle). Recurrent natural disasters
have historically prompted cities to build infrastructure to resist them, such as by channelling rivers, building dams
or dikes or building earthquake-resistant buildings. However, this infrastructure may be compromised if the shock
strikes harder than what it can resist, as has been the case with New Orleans and other cities in southern Florida hit by
hurricane Katrina in 2005 (Dawson, 2017), or the Seine River floods in Paris in 2018 (Willsher, 2018).
Key aspects in mitigating the present and future negative impacts are improved adaptation and resilience. The United
Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) defines resilience as “the ability of a system, community or society
exposed to hazards to resist, absorb, accommodate, adapt to, transform and recover from the effects of a hazard in a
timely and efficient manner, including through the preservation and restoration of its essential basic structures and
functions through risk management” (UNDRR, 2020).
Similarly, urban resilience can be defined as “the capacity of individuals, communities, institutions, businesses, and
systems within a city to survive, adapt, and grow no matter what kinds of chronic stresses and acute shocks they
experience” (100 Resilient Cities, 2020). The notion of urban resilience can be extended to the capabilities of cities to
cope with other challenges, hazards and shocks, both of natural origin (e.g. earthquakes, tsunamis) or technological
origin (e.g. chemical/industrial accidents) and those which are socially produced (e.g. economic downturn, terrorism).
In other words, urban resilience is a general quality of the social, economic and natural systems of the city to be
sufficiently “future-proof” (Thornbush, Golubchikov and Bouzarovski, 2013).
Concerted efforts by multiple stakeholders, including local governments, decision makers, city officials, departments,
central and provincial governments, the private sector, citizens, non-governmental organizations, community-
based organizations, research institutions and international organizations, are required to achieve resilient urban
environments. Stakeholders must collaborate to boost internal capabilities and capacities of urban systems to
withstand these changes, as well as to minimize negative impacts and to maximize benefits. This includes exploring
and enabling the use of existing or emerging technologies for hazard identification, risk prevention and reduction,
detection and early-warning systems, emergency response and mitigation.
Modelling technologies can facilitate the exchange and update of detailed information about building infrastructure
and other building and geographic data. “Building information modelling” (BIM) software helps create digital copies
of built structures (houses, buildings, utilities, bridges, tunnels, ports, roads) along with their resource infrastructure
(water, electricity, gas, communication) and building materials used (concrete, steel, glass, wood etc). This facilitates
the design, construction and maintenance of the buildings. In combination with monitoring, BIM can help alert of
any faults or structural weaknesses. In some countries, BIM has been made mandatory, for example for high-rise
residential buildings in the UK (following the Grenfell Tower fire) or for certain government-funded projects in Russia,
Denmark, the UK and the US (Paul, 2018).
Integration of BIMs with “geographical information systems” (GIS) allows monitoring of the state of the entire building
stock on a local or regional scale along with other data. GIS can cover data from georeferenced seismographs over
periods of time to identify patterns or trends and better predict the location and strength of geology-related disasters
(earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis), while georeferenced population data can provide information about the number
of people requiring rescue in a hazardous event. BIM and GIS can play a major role in guiding cities towards resilience
through a more efficient cross-sectoral coordination, especially for emergency interventions in the face of natural or
technological disaster.
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Preventive measures can help to identify hazard-prone areas and restrict the construction of housing and other urban
objects in such areas. Besides, cities, as socio-technical complexes, also all have different forms of technological hazards,
including with respect to exposure to industrial accidents. The UNECE Guidance on Land-Use Planning, the Siting of
Hazardous Activities and Related Safety Aspects (UNECE, 2017c) presents a good practice approach for integrated
land-use planning. It helps countries to consider land-use planning, industrial safety, disaster risk and environmental
assessment matters, among others, and to implement the provisions of the relevant UNECE instruments4 in an
integrated manner. It supports governments in taking risk-informed decisions on land-use planning and siting, aware
of possible environmental impacts and with the involvement of the public.
The overall vulnerability of a city is ultimately determined by its physical shape and the quality of its socio-economic
infrastructure. Factors, which leave cities badly exposed are a dilapidated and inefficient capital stock, buildings built in
the absence or in violation of construction regulations, poorly maintained urban engineering systems, under-developed
public services, social inequality, and, polarization and deprivation. It is not possible to make cities resilient overnight.
Rather, resilience is purposefully and progressively “accumulated” by improving the quality of both the social well-being
and the physical stock, while incorporating the relevant principles and considerations into all capital investment decisions.
In summary, even when working across different sectors and in a more integrated manner there are no simple and
straightforward mechanisms to address all sustainability problems. However, this chapter has demonstrated the
multiple and integrative roles that cities play in broader sustainability transitions. It has discussed what enablers and
innovative solutions exist today that can be implemented in cities to address societal challenges or to embrace the
opportunities that come out of the contemporary trends and challenges. Various capacities in that regard can be
activated: for example, the importance to mobilise “idle” or neglected capacities; from reengaging with neglected
small cities to reorienting strategies to meet human needs to making value out of waste.
The next chapter will explain how governments on national and municipal levels can activate capabilities of cities
through policymaking and governance practices in a way which will make it possible/easier for cities to implement
the innovative solutions described in this chapter. It introduces the notion of deliberative and flexible modes of
governance that partner with stakeholders to explore opportunities and enable and at times support experimentation.
What institutions and processes are needed to manage people-smart sustainable cities and promote experimentation
more broadly? How can we ensure that investment and development are not locked in suboptimal practices?
4 Industrial Accidents Convention, Espoo Convention and its Protocol on SEA, Aarhus Convention and instruments developed
under the Committee on Urban Development, Housing and Land Management
© DEPOSITPHOTOS
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In order to fully explore their innovative potential for sustainable development and sustainability transitions, as well
as to address the challenges they face, cities should develop an open culture of governance that facilitates reflective
learning, creativity, innovation and co-creation. This can be supported by exploratory multi-level management
mechanisms, facilitating collaboration across different sectors in order to gain evidence and confidence, to design,
pilot, modify, and to scale up ideas (Quaggiotto, Leurs and Christiansen, 2017).
Cross-sectoral collaboration and inter-institutional coordination are central in this respect, as is ensuring coherence
among policies and measures across the board. Even if cities by the nature of their spatial location represent coherent
entities, typically administrations maintain a siloed approach to managing urban resources and development.
Innovative cities develop collaborative platforms to overcome this fragmentation and find solutions for generating
genuinely integrative methods of public management.
However, smart policy intervention is not a prescribed set of strategies with expected results (see figure 6) but rather
it is a continuous and exploratory process. It is set within the dynamic situations of real-life practices that are made up
of complex systems of changing problems that interact with each other. Key actors in this process should therefore
function as learning entities who actively and openly engage with one another to question their ideas and knowledge
and make sense of what needs to be actually done; how this can be done; and what contextual factors may affect the
implementation process.
This form of experimentation and exploration is important for finding new and innovative solutions for sustainable
development where cities play a key role; for example, finding “key nodes in the system” which can have a broader
impact on the efficient use of resources. Many urban problems and challenges require reflective practices that probe
to a deeper level than simply trial-and-error experiences, although it is also true that without making mistakes it is not
possible to innovate. Not only condoning, but openly embracing the failure and, perhaps most importantly, having
the resources and incentives to learn from failure is essential. Urban living labs can be seen as a form of experimental
urban governance; they represent the necessary flexible, inclusive and participatory settings for creation and
innovation (see box 25). Generally, it is important to challenge neophobia (dislike of anything unfamiliar), to overcome
entrenched interests, and to “un-tie” new major decisions from existing situations. Nourishing a culture of innovation
is important for overcoming both industrial decline and uneven development (see box 26).
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Source: National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA) (Quaggiotto, Leurs and Christiansen, 2017).
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© DEPOSITPHOTOS
Box 26: The small industrial town of Renens reinventing itself through innovation ecosystems
The city of Renens (Switzerland) is an industrial town of 20,000 inhabitants close to Lausanne, by the Lake Geneva area.
It has experienced years of decline caused by companies going bankrupt (the most famous being Kodak) or delocalised.
Instead of allowing itself to transform into a suburban “dormitory” town, the local government planned its industrial
revival as a virtuous circle by encouraging new industrial job creation. Taking advantage of the proximity of the Federal
Institute of Technology (EPFL) of Lausanne, Renens transformed its defunct factory premises into spaces and platforms
which facilitate innovation and start-up creation by students and young graduates. These platforms include Fab Labs
(public laboratories with shared tools, equipment and computers, usually aligned with open-source development)
and organizing Hackathons (48-hour start-up creation, from the idea to the business plan). A synergy was also created
between new start-ups, business incubators and the network of industrial parks (technopoles) in the area. This strategy
has allowed the revival of the small town after years of decline, while simultaneously maintaining its identity as an
industrial hub.
Source: Clément (2018).
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Learning and the exchange of good practice and experiences from other contexts is critically important. This includes
the knowledge and exchange of international standards (see box 27).
Box 27: UNECE Portal on Standards for the Sustainable Development Goals
The Standards4SDGs Portal aims to map standards to the goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development. It allows cities to identify standards by international and national organizations that are relevant to their
areas. Standards are defined as documents approved by a recognized body that provides, for common and repeated use,
rules, guidelines or characteristics for products or related processes and production methods, with which compliance is
not mandatory. Standards provide a shared language, common metrics, and concrete tools to translate global principles
into action. Standards can support all three dimensions of sustainable development.
The portal addresses an important gap in capacity building. On the one hand, policymakers are both insufficiently aware
of standards and insufficiently empowered to use them as the basis for their choices at local, national, regional and
global levels. On the other hand, standards organizations are not sufficiently aware of how standards can contribute to
the SDGs. In addition to the standards database, the portal contains case studies on how standards have been used as
the basis for policy interventions by local and national authorities, as well as e-learning training courses, covering risk
management, conformity assessment and market surveillance.
Source: UNECE (2017e).
There has recently been a progressive move towards a “what works” approach to development or what is also
defined as evidence-based, results-driven interventions. An evidence-informed and what works approach can help
to understand and evaluate policies in practice. At the same time, initiatives for people-smart sustainable cities
are inevitably complex due to the involvement of multiple actors, as well as the dynamic and often unpredictable
contextual factors at play. In contrast to technical decisions, designing and implementing effective social policies
cannot be simply evidence-based. This is because decisions involve contested or “wicked” problems (shaped by
different values and concerns) and very complex social, economic, political and institutional conditions for actually
achieving change. Using evidence for making decisions in this context will therefore be “qualitatively different”, that
is, dependent on the actors involved and the conditions in which they operate (Parkhurst, 2017: p. 5).
In other words, the demand is not only for what works but crucially for “why” and “how it works” (see box 28). This
requires integrating additional approaches to and methods of generating project evidence and evaluation, including
an on-going “critical scrutiny” of multiple contextual and implementation factors that may influence (worsen or
improve) the desired urban change. Evaluation should be designed to include ongoing assessments throughout the
life of the initiative; adaptation of the strategy when necessary; and integration of new and changing conditions.
Often too much attention is given to the expected outcomes rather than to identifying mechanisms that have proven
to have positive effects. The focus should be on documenting and analysing the change in practice and effects,
expected as well as unexpected.
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Local fiscal and payment regimes can play a stimulating role in encouraging sustainable - and discouraging
unsustainable - activities or lifestyles. Some examples are public transport fees, parking fees, congestion charges,
property taxes and development charges. However, city-level responses to sustainability challenges are often
circumscribed by the limited fiscal capacities and, indeed, by the limited fiscal autonomy of municipalities or regions.
Even if substantial achievements can be reached with moderate cost – as with regard to, for example, the deployment
of smart-city (ICT-based) technologies – many systematic and comprehensive policies are still capital intensive. City
governments need to identify sustainable sources of revenue for these policies. Financial resources should also be
sought from the private sector; public-private partnerships may share risk and raise finance for infrastructure and
energy efficiency projects. In their turn, national governments must ensure adequate resource mobilisation for local
and regional governments, because it is at the national level that different forms of taxes can be institutionalized
more comprehensively and effectively.
Discussions around urban spending often have limited links to SDGs, the New Urban Agenda and other key international
commitments and their principles, and lacking elaboration on, for example, what represents good or bad sources of
revenues, or good or bad expenditure. The way cities operate much depends on how urban spending is allocated. Sprawl,
segregation, socio-spatial inequality, congestion, lack of affordable housing and public services, and numerous other
problems are the result of poor investment decisions which orient cities to develop in a particular way, serve particular
interests, and systematically fail disadvantaged groups. Urban development projects are often happening at a cost to
the most disadvantaged, through displacement, evictions, gentrification, land speculation, exclusionary practices.
Urban spending though can also work for a sustainable city, a just city, and a liveable city for all kinds of residents.
There is no one-size-fits-all solution but possessing a set of principles is important. These principles should include: a
purposeful search for equity; recognising multiple stakeholders that make cities - private as well as public, collective,
cooperative, community and not-for-profit actors (this can include seed funding and grants for community groups);
and creating enabling conditions for those multiple actors to participate meaningfully in the decision-making about
urban priorities and spending and in urban economic life.
There are innovative and flexible tools that can help to work with those principles while cities look for mobilising the
“right finance” with the private sector. Public-private partnerships (PPPs) typically include risk sharing and financing of
infrastructure construction and operation around hard assets. The “people-first public private partnerships” (people-first
PPPs) mechanism of UNECE emphasises SDG compliance and ensures that, out of all stakeholders, “people” are on the
top. People-first PPPs ensure that people have access to better services at affordable prices. Furthermore, the people-
first PPP impact assessment tool offers an evaluation methodology to benchmark and score PPP infrastructure projects
against these principles, including with regard to their social, economic and environmental impacts (see box 29).
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Procurement is also an effective instrument with which to stimulate innovation. The existing procurement processes
in cities often make it difficult to acquire solutions which have yet to be fully proven. Procurement tenders often
specify the physical attributes of the goods to be procured, derived from the attributes of goods that already exist in
the market, and are awarded to the lowest bidder meeting these specifications. The result is that “cities are unable to
benefit from emerging disruptive technologies quickly enough and are likely to become laggards instead of leading
the way” (EASME and DG GROW, 2019a, pp. 20-21).
Instead of this, innovation-enhancing procurement specifies tenders in terms of the performance the goods (or
infrastructure) have to deliver and selects the bid offering the most economically advantageous terms over the life cycle of
the goods or infrastructure project. This approach allows specifying environmental and social performance criteria, among
other things. The basic premise is that bidders focus on what is needed to be achieved but are left with plenty of room to
develop and experiment with different solutions to achieve those goals. They are consequently paid based on the extent
to which they achieve those goals, rather than on technical specifications. It allows bidding companies to offer innovative
solutions meeting the performance criteria, rather than only products that already exist. This approach also generates
incentives for companies to invest in research and development (R&D) in order to develop such innovative solutions.
To make innovation-enhancing procurement work, leading procurement agencies enter into competitive dialogues
with potential bidders in order to understand the current state of technology and the potential for developing superior
innovative solutions. Leading procurement agencies also use so-called “pre-commercial procurement”, that is, they
provide grants to innovative companies, including local start-ups, to finance R&D and proof of concept on potential
innovative solutions that could then at a later stage compete for a commercial procurement tender. Such change
“requires an open innovation culture and the right set-up to allow more flexible engagement with local innovation
ecosystems” (EASME and DG GROW, 2019b, p. 70). To facilitate citizen engagement, government procurement should
make space for contractors to engage with citizens to identify problems and co-create solutions.
A good example of this is the Kyiv Smart City (non-government) initiative (Kyiv Smart City, 2020), which brings
together Kyiv citizens, the business community, activists and city authorities to develop intelligent smart urban
infrastructure and city services. Apart from being responsible for the deployment of digital infrastructure in the city
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and developing new service integration hubs (such as Kyiv ID accounts to access all online public services in the city),
it provides enabling platforms for start-ups and innovative ideas which can then be upscaled in Kyiv and other cities. It
also incorporates participatory budgeting as it allows social initiatives to emerge and be voted for, with the potential
to receive support from the city budget. Kyiv Smart City has also attracted international partners who use Kyiv as an
experimental testbed for their smart city ideas.
City governments should seek a broader participation of stakeholders, including the involvement of all different
social groups of population in decision-making. This is to inform or to be informed by the knowledge of the local
community and to share the ownership, vision and legitimacy of new strategies with a larger group of stakeholders,
thus ensuring their more successful implementation.
The key question for progressive participation is to what extent residents are capable to actually initiate change and
collectively shape cities to their aspirations and consequently share empowerment and pride in their cities. In other
words, whether residents genuinely have the right to the city or whether this right is “privatized” by a small political
and economic elite.
While citizen engagement is the must here, there should be an understanding that the participation of only some
groups does not directly translate into fairness. First of all, in many contexts, people who engage more tend to come
from the educated classes and have economic power, so power imbalances may only grow. Second, citizens will
lobby for their own interests, which may not necessarily coincide with the broader interests of the society. Wealthy
homeowners, for example, may want to stop affordable housing developments in their area. Cities also need to make
sure to make decisions that benefit society at large, not just the voices that speak up the loudest.
Participatory planning and participatory budgeting are some of the tools for co-designing and co-producing cities
and priorities directly alongside with their residents. In Paris, 5 per cent of their total investment budget (about EUR
100 million) has been distributed via a participatory budgeting programme every year, allowing people to propose
and vote for different ideas (Veron, 2018). The Toronto Strong Neighbourhoods Strategy requires the City of Toronto to
partner with residents, community agencies and businesses to invest in people, services, programmes and facilities in
identified neighbourhood improvement areas. The strategy strengthens the social, economic and physical conditions
of the city and delivers local impact for city-wide change (City of Toronto, 2020).
Transparency, accountability and the effective inclusion of all groups and inhabitants in decision-making processes -
including NGOs, local communities, academia, businesses and other stakeholders - are key ingredients for sustainable
urban planning and management. Such participation and cooperation can also bring in missing technical expertise.
For example, universities represent an intellectual resource at the local level that can support city governments
in developing policies and strategies and play a key role in building knowledge on practices through changes in
education curriculum and teaching methods.
The provisions of the Aarhus Convention and its Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers (PRTR) (see box 30)
can promote effective access to information and the informed participation of the public in decision-making relating
to different aspects of urban development. This can help ensure that the development and implementation of plans,
programmes and other decisions related to human settlement planning and management are pursued through
transparent, accountable and participatory decision-making, thereby helping to identify the most sustainable
measures at an early stage of planning. The Aarhus Convention is an important procedural tool to ensure the quality
of life of urban residents and for urban environmental protection. It gives rights to city dwellers to directly participate
in decision-making on, for instance, landscape design and alteration and urban planning, as well as to contribute their
knowledge on real, local problems and propose solutions.
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Box 30: The Aarhus Convention and its Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers
The provisions of the UNECE Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access
to Justice in Environmental Matters (Aarhus Convention), adopted in 1998, promote effective access to information and
informed participation. Together with its Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers, it protects every person’s
right to live in an environment adequate to his or her health and well-being and enhances accountability, transparency
and responsiveness of governments. It grants rights to the public and imposes obligations on parties and authorities
regarding access to information and justice, and public participation in decision-making in national and international
contexts. The Aarhus Convention is a global instrument; any United Nations Member State can accede to the Convention.
Due to its cross-cutting nature, the Convention offers procedures and standards applicable in different sectors, such as
urban development, tourism, energy and green economy. The Maastricht Recommendations (UNECE, 2015) developed
under the Convention assist members of the public and officials at national and local levels on a day-to-day basis when
designing and carrying out procedures on public participation in decision-making on different matters. Their seven-step
model of effective public participation is widely applied in countries.
The Kyiv Protocol on Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers (PRTRs) became international law binding its parties in
2009. It is the only legally binding international instrument on pollutant release and transfer registers. Its objective
is “to enhance public access to information through the establishment of coherent, nationwide pollutant release and
transfer registers.” PRTRs are inventories of pollution from industrial sites and other sources. PRTRs, in particular the
map-based visualization of registered sources of pollutant releases, help to identify the most suitable place for different
components of urban planning (houses, green zones, industrial facilities), thereby helping to minimize potential risks
for the environment and health.
The portal Aarhus Clearinghouse (https://aarhusclearinghouse.unece.org/) provides a wealth of information and a
collection of good practice examples at a local level regarding effective access to environmental information and public
participation in decision-making that can be used in urban areas. With the support of the Organization for Security
and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and in cooperation with UNECE, more than 50 Aarhus Centres across 15 countries
throughout the UNECE region support local communities in raising awareness and use of their environmental rights and
can be instrumental in promoting environmental governance and well informed and engaged public in urban planning
processes.
Source: UNECE (2020c).
An example of how PRTR data can influence urban planning and the organization of a region comes from Israel. Israel
used PRTR air emission data to account for health risks at the planning stage of an industrial zone of the city of Haifa.
The city had the highest number of reporting facilities to the Israeli PRTR in 2017, particularly in the petrochemical
industry. This helped decision makers to identify potential risks and find solutions. The National Economic Council
decided to address the health risks by moving the refineries, based on the understanding that the pollution is
preventing Haifa metropolis area from developing and that the move will lead to the revival of the entire region
(Israeli Ministry of Environmental Protection, 2018).
Participatory, well informed and inclusive decision-making helps ensure that the final outcome of a plan, policy or
project will be more acceptable, more sustainable and less harmful to the environment and health. It also means that
hidden or unexpected aspects of a proposed plan can be uncovered early, helping to avoid costly mistakes and public
discontent.
New technologies and digitalization, open data, open government, e-government initiatives and suchlike can help
public authorities to make information publicly accessible more effectively and efficiently. It is easier and cheaper for
authorities to actively disseminate data and information through online portals. Open data structures, in particular
spatial data, have become available at a much lower cost. As a result, platforms can also visualize data in the form of
maps and hence present information in a more user-friendly manner. In addition to making information available by
public authorities, citizen-driven initiatives like citizen science increasingly have the potential to facilitate effective
access to information and public participation in decision-making.
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Digitalization allows the public to participate in decision-making easier through mobile apps and online platforms
(see box 31). There is also a trend that NGOs, individual or groups of citizens are stepping in by programming their own
mobile applications or online tools when they see that important (environmental) information is either not available
or not provided in an easily accessible, user-friendly way by public authorities. They use this information to advocate
for their right to a healthy environment and to provide direct feedback to local authorities on when they request the
authority to resolve an issue and take action to improve a government service. In addition, with an increasing use
of the “internet of things”, public authorities start to draw on data collected by individuals through their personal
monitoring devices and hence make this environmental information broadly available to the public.
There are still important issues with regard to these digital trends. For example, it is still common to find a silo approach
towards open data, e-government and thematic datasets management. This can lead to the multiplication of systems,
standards, tools and processes; sharing data between these systems often creates additional challenges when no
common standard or interface exists. Using the same data standards and harmonized approach is required (European
Environment Agency, 2019).
Furthermore, with a greater use of online participation platforms and mobile applications, there is a risk that groups
that are less familiar with new technology are left behind (older persons, rural population). There may also be a lack
of a systemic approach to identifying those citizens who need to participate. This ultimately leads to the exclusion
of some vulnerable and marginalized groups. Finally, dishonest city politicians or administrators and other vested
interest groups may manipulate technological algorithms and collected data if e-governance systems lack full public
oversight, independent verification and audit. Therefore, new technologies should be used in a way that they are
accessible and available in understandable formats. ICT tools must be adjusted to the various needs of the population
to ensure an inclusive approach. In any rate, it is important to emphasise that ICT tools are complementary to more
traditional tools and may not replace them in all situations. Digital technologies cannot and should not be the only
means for citizens to engage with administrations.
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Planning systems vary across countries, but typically the instruments of spatial planning are organized hierarchically
at different levels: national comprehensive and sectoral spatial plans (which can support the implementation of
national urban policy); regional spatial plans; city and local development plans; and detailed building plans. Planning
at the national level is critical when it comes to mitigating inter-regional inequalities, spreading out development
opportunities and coordinating the construction of backbone infrastructural systems and improving intra-national
connectivity. National planning can often take the form of national urban policy, such as in Poland (Krajowa Polityka
Miejska), which regularly sets out the urban policy-related activities of the Government.
Regional planning provides a strategic framework for land use, infrastructure, connectivity and environmental
management on a broader scale than individual settlements. At the city level, urban design and layout, urban
aesthetics, provision of transit and other public services, and integrated infrastructural systems are some of the urban
planning considerations that have long been acknowledged among the principal instruments for sustainable cities.
Spatial planning is also important when it comes to housing policy. Land use strategies and processes of identifying
developable land, alongside public conditions associated with its release for development, greatly impact housing
supply and prices. Zoning restrictions protect the character of the city, health of residents, green belts and essential
environmental quality, but if used too rigidly or without due consideration of social impacts they could also contribute
to social exclusion (The Economist, 2020b).
This is particularly the case in the context of the deregulation and financialization of the housing markets, coupled
with the privatization of social rental housing which took place in the 1980s-1990s in a push for homeownership.
A lack of proper competition between different housing segments (i.e. between free market commercial housing,
high-quality public housing, and rent-controlled tenure-secure private rental market) creates unhealthy demand for
homeownership, pushes housing prices up and makes housing in “hot spot” areas beyond the reach of low-income
earners and sometimes even average income earners. This also contributes to gentrification and segregation. Rather
than aiming to counterbalance these socially negative processes, planning practice in many cities is sometime found
to be complicit to them and, if so, needs to be firmly rethought (Badyina and Golubchikov, 2016).
Planning is also instrumental in environmental assessment and management, as well as identifying risk-prone zones,
restricting building activities within them and for providing spatial strategies to safeguard urban infrastructure.
Planning decisions on land use and urban layout have impacts lasting for decades and even centuries. Particular land
use and infrastructural patterns create circles of “path dependence” where future investments are predetermined by
existing infrastructure, locking places into particular uses, lifestyles and patterns. Spatial planning is important in order
to prevent being locked into unsustainable or hazard-prone conditions that will be expensive or even impossible to
alter later. The use of instruments like “strategic environmental assessment” (SEA) can assist planners in identifying
the environmental and health concerns in proposed urban plans and developments. SEA ensures that explicit
consideration is given to environmental factors well before the final decision is taken on plans and programmes
which are likely to have significant environmental, including health, effects (see box 32).
The potential of urban planning is today realized in the design of new eco-, low carbon and smart cities or districts
worldwide. While there are encouraging examples, it is even more important to act in existing urban districts, where
there is a large potential for paving a more sustainable future through climate-smart urban planning.
The professional planning practice itself should grapple more effectively with the digital, technological and social
realities of today, as well as expectations of citizens for people-smart sustainable cities. For example, in many countries
(paradoxically in the wealthiest ones especially) the 21st century planning work still relies on the 19th century methods.
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Even in online public domains, planning-related documents frequently are accessible only as a batch of scanned
PDF files, with little transparency, systematisation and inter-search functionality. Smart planning can provide more
value and convenience to the public. Digitally enabled planning, smart approaches using big data, modelling, 3-D
visualisation, AI and augmented reality are already extensively used in commercial applications and can deliver better
outcomes for a variety of stakeholders across the planning system.
Box 33: Multilateral environmental agreements to support transboundary cooperation and risk mitigation
The UNECE Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context (Espoo Convention) sets out
the obligations of parties to assess the environmental impact of certain activities at an early stage of planning. It also
lays down the obligation of the States to notify and consult each other on all major projects under consideration (such
as industrial facilities) that are likely to have a significant adverse environmental impact across boundaries.
The UNECE Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA Protocol) (see also box 32) sets outs provision to ensure
that individual parties integrate environmental assessment into their plans and programmes, such as land-use or
strategic master plans at the earliest stages.
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Box 33: Multilateral environmental agreements to support transboundary cooperation and risk mitigation
(continued)
The UNECE Convention on the Transboundary Effects of Industrial Accidents (Industrial Accidents Convention) aims at
protecting human beings and the environment against industrial accidents, including those caused by natural hazards
(so-called NaTech). Its programme of work on land-use planning and industrial safety helps countries to make risk-
informed decisions on the siting of hazardous activities, or significant modifications thereof, and to establish policies in
areas which could be affected by the transboundary effects of an industrial accident.
The UNECE Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes (Water
Convention) provides an intergovernmental platform for climate change adaptation, including flood and drought
management in transboundary basins. In 2018 the Water Convention in collaboration with UNDRR developed the
Implementation Guide for Addressing Water-Related Disasters and Transboundary Cooperation, which also addresses the
role of cities in climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction. It promotes integrating adaptation and disaster
risk reduction into urban redevelopment programmes and encourages continuous learning and city to city knowledge
networks (UNECE, 2018b).
The UNECE Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (Air Convention) seeks to reduce air pollution and
emissions. The Air Convention provides access to emission, measurement and modelling data and information on the
effects of air pollution on ecosystems, health, crops and materials. While parties set concrete emission reduction targets
at the national level, fewer emissions at the national level achieved under the Air Convention also mean an improvement
in the air quality at the city level. As air pollution needs to be tackled at all different scales, the newly established Expert
Panel on Clean Air in Cities analyses and communicates the potential benefits of multi-scale air quality management and
aims to find an optimal mix of local, national and international policy actions.
Source: UNECE (2018c).
Many important initiatives, projects and processes cross the boundaries of individual administrative jurisdictions
(e.g. infrastructural projects or public transport). Metropolitan areas are often divided into a fragmented matrix of
municipalities, which presents a demand for a regional State to coordinate municipalities on sustainable planning
and transport development such as the Cardiff Capital Region (see box 34).
There are also examples of “transboundary urban agglomerations”, some of which even share major infrastructural
facilities like airports; for example, Malmo-Copenhagen, Basel/Mulhouse/Freiburg. Cross-border cooperation can go
from creating a mutual platform for getting stakeholders from cross-border cities to regularly meet and exchange
expertise all the way to the creation of a cross-border local government body in a bid to mutualise infrastructures and
resources. The Geneva metropolitan area has a cross-border administration and coordination body made of delegates
representing the Swiss and French municipalities which constitute this area. The body oversaw the construction and
operation of the Leman Express, which became widest cross-border regional railway network of Europe through the
coordination of vehicle, personnel and infrastructure management.
Cross-border cooperation facilitates economic integration, without forcing uniformity, in a bid to create transnational
corridors, as is also exemplified by the Niagara Community Observatory in the Rust Belt of the USA and Canada. The
observatory monitors the daily number of people and goods crossing the US-Canada border and promotes initiatives
towards economic integration while preserving economic sovereignty. Some corridors monitored include the Buffalo-
Niagara corridor which represents a metropolitan area of about 10 million people and was a point of passage for 16
per cent of all the US-Canada trade in 2017 (Friedman, Conteh and Philips, 2019).
The role of regional (sub-national) administrations as coordinating, enabling and funding bodies cannot be
overstated. They can facilitate cooperation and overcome the potential fragmentation of local efforts. An effective
instrument (especially for infrastructural projects) is regional spatial planning, which may be administered by regional
governments. Cities which have a ”regional” administrative mandate (often the case for larger cities) are more capable
of facilitating larger projects and territorial cohesion.
City-focused cooperation also stretches internationally, which is important for learning good practices. This can include
successes but also failures. There are alliances and networks of cities working across borders towards sustainability,
such as the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI), C40 (a network of megacities) or the
World Smart City Forum. More than 130 cities, including smaller cities from Europe and other parts of the world, have
started to organize themselves into a new initiative called Open and Agile Smart Cities (OASC). Their ambition is to
exchange experiences along their digitization journey and align the urban data platform, common standards and
application programming interface (API) they are based on to form a larger and more coherent ecosystem (EASME,
2019a). International organizations, including the United Nations, use their mandates to facilitate those networks and
exchange. For example, UNECE has launched the new Forum of Mayors as a regular international exchange platform,
following the Day of Cities in 2019 (see box 35).
5 SUMMARY
POINTS
A cities-based approach to sustainable development
Cities today are the driving force in economic, social, and cultural life, as well as environmental transformations. As
such, cities must be paid particular attention in national, international and multilateral debates and policies. Cities
are where many new solutions and innovation emerge, often through experimentation among stakeholders with
research, products, services, business models, partnerships, and governance arrangements. Many cities pioneer
solutions for sustainable development, which are then universally shared. The achievement of the majority of the
United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is not possible without a deep and fundamental involvement
at the city level and utilizing the massive innovative potential of cities. The centrality of cities to implement solutions
for sustainability – in a manner that create values to all citizens – needs to be recognised and utilized across all fields of
policy actions. Furthermore, as city administrators are implementing national and international commitments, their
voice needs to be heard at the national and international levels too.
of waste. In any case, the strong potential of cities with respect to sustainability should not be taken for granted but
should be systematically nourished and promoted. This requires working across sectoral departments horizontally
and at all levels of administration on urban matters. Vertical integration of policy also means feeding back urban
experiences to the central government so that policy at all levels is well informed and can continue to evolve.
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This publication is prepared within the “Sustainable and smart cities for all ages”
nexus and advocates a “cities-based” approach to sustainable development.
Cities are made of people, by people and for people. Sustainable measures will
have to make sense to inhabitants of cities, making their life more liveable.
Furthermore, it is people who drive sustainability and who are its ultimate
source and beneficiaries. This vision underpins the notion of people-smart
sustainable cities, introduced in this publication.
Information Service
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
Layout and Printing at United Nations, Geneva – 2014426 (E) – December 2020 – 606 – ECE/INF/2020/3